Twittering My Life Away

In my ongoing quest to stay on top of the latest societal trends and cutting-edge technology, I recently began to get my Twitter on. No, Twitter is NOT an anatomical term, although it certainly sounds like one. ("Every time I cough, I get a sharp pain right below my Twitter.")

Actually, Twitter is a "social networking and micro-blogging service" that allows users to track the daily activities and whereabouts of their "friends." In the language of Twitter, "friends" can include complete strangers who have a creepy interest in knowing what you're doing and where you're doing it.

In the shell of a nut, here's how Twitter works: After signing up for a free account, you can begin to follow posted updates--called "Tweets"--from other Twitter users. You can also begin to post your own Tweets, which are very short (140 characters or less) and usually pretty mundane. For example, a typical Tweet could be something like this: "I'm picking my nose with one hand and stirring the spaghetti sauce with the other." Or this: "I just passed gas and blamed it on the dog." Or this: "I just saw my son's baseball coach in a bar dressed up like a woman."

If you think Twitter sounds a lot like stalking, you're right--except for one important difference: Stalkers don't usually have permission to follow you. However, when you sign up for Twitter, you're basically saying, "Hey, all you creepy people out there in Creepville! I hereby give you permission to creepily track my daily activities for whatever creepy reason you creeps may have."

I suspect that it's only a matter of time before an accused stalker tries to clear his name in court by utilizing the "Twitter Defense." (When this actually happens, remember that you first heard this prediction right here.) The defendant's plea might sound something like this: "Your honor, I was not stalking the plaintiff. My computer was broken, so when I peeked into her bedroom window at midnight, I was simply attempting to obtain a visual "tweet."

But if I may be serious for a moment, I just want to remind my fellow Twitterers to be very careful about the information you include in your Tweets. For obvious reasons, the following Tweet would not be a good idea: "I'll be out of town this weekend, and since my home alarm is still broken, I hid all my valuables under the bed in my spare bedroom."

That's all for now. Happy Twittering!