This is definitely an old and outdated post on twitter, but seriously, I am starting to be very amazed, and at the same time, afraid of Twitter's immerse potential.
First off, it is really an unmoderated tool. In the sense that any topic goes. Nothing is blocked. Only suspect bot/spam accounts are terminated. But otherwise, anything goes.
Second, it is real time. Seriously. Want the latest news? Want the latest 'review' of a product, shop, place? Just run it through twitter search. You get the tweets people have on that particular topic you want, in reverse chronological order. And it will very likely to be more accurate than a site review of the same topic done, say, 6 months ago. For a software product, 6 months can involve many different iterations of software release.
What does this imply? Quite simply, that twitter is a force that no one can ignore anymore. Nowadays, if I am to buy a new software, book, or want to find out on a particular technology, I do a twitter search first. See what the others are talking about or feeling about it. As mentioned above, this is definitely a more accurate voice than a website review, which could be either outdated, or even worse, be biased because it has an invested interest into seeing the product spread, or just simply under pressure to do a favorable review.
Two more examples. I was having problem with a product, and I tweeted about it. Almost within a day, the product support tweeted back to help me. Same for my collegue, who was trying to contact a product for additional support and help via email, but did not get a reply in days. He tweeted about it, and they got back to him within hours. These companies know, that ignoring twitter, and they are ignoring the voices of the community, which affect their reputation, and thus their income.
I do wish that it would spread to beyond software and internet related news. Just recently, I had a very bad experience of customer service at a local shop. My first instinct was to actually tweet about it. Of course, I could be the one in a million who had the bad luck to be served by a bad customer service personnel. I could report it to her manager too. But in many cases, the manager does not take any actions. Or worse, in some cases, the managers themselves are rude. I am not asking to be serve as a king, but when I asked in a nice tone about something you sell, the least you could reply was in a nice tone about it, or even a simple 'I'm sorry I do not know' would do. If twitter could one day become so universal that everyone look to it as a source of authority and information, and could help shape and influence a shop's reputation and revenue, the shop could become a better place.
Of course, we then run into the risk of sabotages and esponiage. That would be a problem I am unsure of how to solve. Perhaps I am overly naive, but I would imagine that if one do evil to rise to the top, retribution would come one form or another. Of course, I could be very wrong.
But that is not the point of this post. The point is, twitter is very powerful. It is creeping into, and definitely affecting my decision making in many cases. On one hand, I am fearful that it becomes part of the decision making of everyone. But on the other, it provides a very loud user voice and is an excellent feedback channel.
And then there is a political aspect. Just look at the recent obama election last year. The attack on CNET on its failure to cover iran protests and elections. The china media blackout of the tian an men anniversary. Even government should not neglect the power of twitter as a media.
Next, I would not be surprised if the Singapore government would call for a moderation of the Internet again, especially on tweets. I do hope they can participate in it more actively in a positive manner, and not view it as a threat.
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