This Is Not A Tweet

Jim Johnson wrote I thoughtful response to my posts "Socratic Irony" and The Socratic Method. I continue to believe Twitter is not journalism. Johnson argues Twitter is a new portal for information. I don't have any major disagreement with that. I run the Pushing Rope rss feed on Twitter.

The media has badly hopped on the Twitter bandwagon. I don't feel more informed after reviewing David Gregory's Twitter page. I'm not interested in Gregory's reading choices. I want information on current events. The NPR Politics, Political Wire and Talking Points Memo feeds do a better job posting interesting links. Twitter serves as either friends texting each other or as the new Metafilter. (Minus the flame wars.)

Miami Herald columnist Leonard Pitts wrote how other journalists poorly used Twitter.

Which is not to imply that only pols have gone Twitter mad. CNN's Roland Martin is stuck at an airport in Chicago, trying to get to snowbound New York City even as I write this: ''No flights allowed in,'' he tweets. ``I was on plane in Chicago, we pulled out, got word, now back at gate.''

NBC's Ann Curry, meantime, is in New York enjoying the snow: ``All stars are not the proper shoes for NYC today. But seeing this dark city frosted in white is worth my cold toes.''

And you and I need to know this because . . . ?

America has two wars and the biggest financial crisis since the depression. News junkies don't need to know about Roland Martin's travel problems. If Twitter is the future of journalism then God help us all.

A Twitter user can not write a New York Times-style op-ed. Twitter only allows 140 text characters. Posts are designed to be short. If you have a short attention span, Twitter is for you. Complex issues aren't made to be shrunk into small bits. There is nothing wrong with Twitter as a portal to news services. The media needs to figure out posting random nonsense is not news.

Tom Tomorrow latest comic strip captures the silliness of people that think blogs and Twitter will replace the media.