Seen Here: Thunder

This very Friday morning (a very Friday indeed), I woke to a harrowing recollection. At some indistinguishable time the night before, my whole body and sense of self were jolted awake by some echoing force of a rumbling nature- a crashing wrath of compelling, moving darkness that passed throughout the Capitol Hill sky with a dynamic death-grip over the whole of the atmosphere.

I’m being told it was thunder. Or possibly the beginning of the apocalypse. Seriously, it was ridiculous.

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Update your twitter in class and you might get a glare from your professor. Tweet at a G20 Summit protest and you could get arrested.

That’s exactly what happened to Elliot Madison—a 41-year-old, self-described New York Anarchist—who allegedly used Twitter to advise protesters at the Pittsburgh economic summit where police would be stationed so they could evade the officers.

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Eric de la Cruz and his sister Veronica. Veronica is using social networking websites to raise money for a heart transplant for her brother.

Eric de la Cruz needs a heart transplant.  In his home state of Nevada, there are no doctors who perform the surgery that de la Cruz needs, and he’s unable to look out-of-state due to insurance restrictions.

Cruz’s sister, former CNN anchor Veronica de la Cruz, has been milking social networking sites such as Twitter and Facebook like crazy over the last several weeks to raise money for her brother’s operation—and she’s gotten some help from some notable celebrities.

Trent Reznor, frontman of industrial rockers Nine Inch Nails, has taken up the cause and raised over $850,000 thanks to his 589,986 twitter followers.

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Cameron Dollar, a former assistant coach at the University of Washington, has been hired as head coach at Seattle University. Photo by Braden VanDragt

Just a few weeks in to his coaching career at Seattle University, Cameron Dollar has distinguished himself from predecessor Joe Callero in a small, yet forward-looking, way: He’s documenting his coaching experience, albeit sporadically, by blogging at camerondollar.com.

Dollar’s first post is titled “The Fire Starter” and links to this short profile of him by ESPN recognizing him as a “super assistant.” Quotes in the side bar of the blog exude praise for him.

But the new coach is also using the blog to spread some news about his fledgling Division I program. For example, a May 5 post announces the signing of the Redhawks’ first recruit, Adam Eakles. Another Twitter-like post announces Sacramento Kings player Spencer Hawes’ presence in his office.

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In my quest to prove how silly Twitter is, I have stumbled upon this link. Well, more accurately, my friend Andrew sent me this link. A quote:

everyone is making things that connect to twitter. the arduino environment makes it easy to interface hardware to the internet. this, plus a strong disdain for twitter, was all that was necessary to turn a joke into reality: a toilet that will post to twitter with every flush.

The sad part is that these toilet “tweets” are probably more interesting than %90 of Twitter.

"Tweet"

First of all, I’m alive.

Now that that’s out of the way, are you ready for this? I’m going to warn you; it’s a pretty long post. But it reads fast! This social fad has gone on too long, and I’m going to let you know why it needs to end. Are you ready? Let’s start with a brief story:

Outside in a park, Tim and Jim sit at at a picnic bench sharing a pound of Ezell’s chicken. It’s autumn, leaves are falling, a brisk air hits their cheeks.

“It’s cold out.” Tim says.

“I know.”

“Why are we outside?”

“I don’t know. You said you wanted some fresh air.”

Awkward silence. They both grab for a piece of chicken and stick it in their mouths. As they chew, they search for a discussion piece. Jim swallows his chicken and begins speaking.

“Did you hear that tweet, bro?”

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I knew it, I knew it all along that there was something bad about this whole Twitter thing. This is one Internet social networking tool I’ve refused to jump on board with. Isn’t it just like Facebook, minus all of the good stuff? Also, the words/verbs that Twitter has spawned are ridiculous. “Oh I’m just tweeting.” “You know who tweeted me today?” How can you say that with a straight face?

Now let me stop my rant and say that Twitter does have it’s advantages. It’s a great way to stalk people. Okay, that was the last jab I had to get in. Twitter can be useful, as it has been for The Spectator, to keep people up to date on important things happening in our world. Read more…