Twitter: A News Source or Strictly Social?

I've always had reservations about Twitter, but the latest blowup involving the very popular social networking site put those reservations at the forefront of my mind.

Thanks to Twitter, America learned today that Obama called Kanye West a "Jackass". (This is a day after the whole Kanye West/Taylor Swift fiasco at the MTV Video Music Awards.)

ABC's Reporter Terry Moran was interviewing the President, and during the interview, he tweeted that President Obama called Kanye West the certainly-inappropriate-for-an-interview name.

The tweet was taken down an hour later, but by that time the damage had been done. What President Obama was quoted as saying was already all over the internet.

You can listen to Obama's comment and read ABC's official statement when you continue reading....




An ABC Spokesperson released this statement:

"In the process of reporting on remarks by President Obama that were made during a CNBC interview, ABC News employees prematurely tweeted a portion of those remarks that turned out to be from an off-the-record portion of the interview. This was done before our editorial process had been completed. That was wrong. We apologize to the White House and CNBC and are taking steps to ensure that it will not happen again."

This ordeal caused me to analyze twitter and think about how it is used. For some, twitter is a social website to tweet pointless tweets- such as talking about funny moments in the day or about finding a favorite cereal brand at Wal-Mart.

But for others, Twitter is a news source. There are people who actually log on to Twitter in the morning to receive their daily news. Who can blame them? After all, most of the major news outlets have a twitter account.

So what exactly was the ABC reporter thinking when he tweeted an off-the-record comment from an interview on a major website? At the time, was he just attempting to use twitter for social purposes? Maybe he was just trying to let his friends know about an "off the wall" comment the President made.

I think that it needs to be decided once and for all: Is Twitter strictly social, or is it another valid news source?

There needs to be a formal declaration so that everyone who uses Twitter can know how to appropriately use it! Until Twitter's blurry line between the two is defined, we will continue to have mistakes like this.

What do you think Twitter is?

COMMENT.

My words are up.