Fixity and credit in the twitter age

In the digital era, there have been many enemies in the battle of fixity, credit and and reliable information. They have come in the form of wikipedia, where just about anyone can edit an article causing a big issue with fixity, to issues of credit with pirating, through programs like bittorrent and limewire, and to what I believe is one of the biggest threats to internet fixity and credit, Twitter. I believe the proliferation of twitter, coupled with how new it is, is creating an environment where lack of fixity and credit can lead to disastrous consequences.

We'll look at what twitter is and how it has spread across the world as a medium for a huge variety of messages. Twitter is what's called a microblog. It is essentially a blog that can be posted to 140 characters at a time. We will then look at how the microblogging medium is used and it's rise to popularity.

Then we'll look at is the ability of people to take credit for whatever they want, and more importantly, how people can use other's identity (especially celebrity's) for their own gain or evil purposes. I will talk about the lighter side of being a "tweetthief" and how harmless it can sometimes be to send someone else's plagiarized ideas. Then I will discuss how fake celebrity twitter accounts can be used to spread malicious viruses and false content. Then I will move onto how twitter is trying to keep people from using celebrity credentials for their own personal gain.

Next I will talk about fixity and how it's been taken advantage of in the digital age. People are used to official-looking text to be accurate. I will then discuss how people use legitimate "retweets" but change a link address in it for malicious purposes. I will then discuss the hoaxes that have been carried out through twitter and then finally discuss the possibilities of twitter to cause panic.

Bibliography

Cascio, Jamais. Fast Company. 17 June 2009. 2 12 2010 .

This article discusses the possibilities of social networking, specifically Twitter, to be used to help perpetrate genocide under the right conditions. I will use it in my paper to demonstrate the power that social media can hold and how, possibly, horrific the outcome could be

Heussner, Ki Mae. ABC News/ Technology. 15 January 2010. 2 12 2010 .

This article talks about the different twitter hoaxes that have been perpetrated over the last few years. It shows real world scenarios that show how misinformation through media like Twitter can cause panic and the spread if said misinformation

Johns, Adrian. "The Book of Nature and the Nature of the Book." The Book History Reader. Routledge, 2006. 255-272.

In this book Johns talks about the history of fixity throughout the print age and how the printing press increased fixity and helped establish the credit of the author. I'm going to use this chapter to contrast how the print revolution helped establish fixity and credit while the digital one is seeming to do the opposite in some cases.

Pierson, Garrett. Social Media Vision . 8 January 2009. 2 12 2010 .

Garrett uses this article to shed some light on the etiquette of "retweeting" and how people can use it to their own gain. I'm going to use this article to show how easy it is to steal other people's ideas and also how easy it is to modify a retweat to sneak in your own link.

Schofield, James. Technology Blog. 12 June 2009. 2 12 2010 .

Schofield's article talks about how twitter is trying to combat fake celebrity profiles and some of the backlash caused by some of these fake celebrities. This article will help me further show what a person can do when there is no proof of credit, that is, no proof that the real celebrity is writing said tweets.

Stengel, Richard. "Technology and Culture." Time 15 June 2009.

Stengel's article discusses the cultural changes that things like twitter has brought about. He also argues that the phrase "the medium is the message" holds true in twitter. I'm going to use this article to demonstrate the popularity and power that twitter is gaining.

"Twitter power // Learning from ourselves, in real time." USA Today 25 May 2010: 01a.

This article goes into more depth into the power that twitter is gaining as a distributor of media despite its limited character content. It talks about the good that twitter can do, citing the Haiti relief efforts that were organized through social media like twitter. I'll use this article to show that while fixity might be on the decline, it might not be a bad thing

Yates, S and T Summner. "Digital Genres and the New Burden of Fixity." IEEE (1997).

Yates and Summner's article might be a little more dated then the rest of them, but it gives us a great insight into how the idea that media should be fixed is a a little out dated in the digital world. I'm going to use this article to show that media is migrating away from needing to have fixity.