The invention of Twitter back in the spring of 2006 caused a revolution, both cyber and colloquial. It created a new form of communication which would soon take over media, corporations, politics, and social networking services. It has made a significant impact on the younger generation’s vernacular sparking debates over whether Twitter inhibits literacy potential or if it has just defined the ever-evolving cyber cloud of jargon used by Millennials. Twitter is definitely a double edged sword, developing a new side to the English language through concise, direct, expressive sentences. While on the other hand it has led to the incorporation of LOL-speak, fractured grammar, informal acronyms and emoticons in formal essays. It is abhorrent to think such causality would ever be considered acceptable in formal writing, but the growth and inter connectivity of social media has left lines extremely blurred. Can you name the last news article you read that did not have a “tweet” button allowing you to instantly share?
However you may view Twitter, there is no denying the cultural impact is has made. #YOLO anyone? The trick to Twitter is developing a creative, expressive statement with a 140 character limit. That doesn’t seem too bad, but then there is the pressure to create a clever ‘ hashtag’, something you hope catches on and starts to ‘trend’ on the twitterverse. Though hashtags are insignificant to searching and filtering, they still allow the millions of tweeters to be active members in their twitter world. I am still anxiously waiting for #photofinish to be a top trend, but until that day comes I will settle for #cyclists or @thecyclemsnbc to make the lists.