Breaker breaker good buddy

Back in the late 70's, everyone suddenly got into CB radio. It was a very odd fad, and you could buy books that explained how CB radio worked, and how the jargon worked -- everybody spoke in code so that Smokey wouldn't be able to catch you on the flip flop. There were songs, movies, comics and t-shirts about CB.

My dad got a CB radio, and we hooked it up in our van and listened to truckers and other CB type people when we drove on vacation. We came up with a handle, a cool name that we could use when we talked over the radio.

CB stands for Citizens Band, and the whole thing was about regular people going on the radio and talking to the world, and listening to other people doing the same, joining an amazing conversation and creating a brand new kind of virtual social network, connected over vast distances.

It turned out that no one really had very much to say, and CB eventually dwindled away -- though I'm sure truckers still use it to communicate important info between themselves, as the medium did exist for a reason.

Twitter is CB radio all over again, aside from the part about it having some kind of valid reason to exist.

Don't make me unleash my Twitter army, IMAX

Seriously. I am not screwing around.

We will descend on you and unleash ... uh ... tweets and shit the likes of which your mother only warned you about, or something!

I command an army of twittering people, reading the stuff that I post and man, let me tell you, all it will take is one word from me and -- BOOM! -- your ass is grass.

Don't mess with my twitter army, IMAX, or we will unleash our wrath upon you in carefully measured 140 character barrages, until you return my $5.

Astronaut may share his thoughts on the humbling wonder of space and the glory of seeing the Earth from orbit, in less than 140 characters

In what is surely to be a first in manned spaceflight, Astronaut Mike Massimino says he may attempt to communicate from space with people back on earth.

Well, maybe not the first time that someone has communicated, but the first time someone has communicated directly with civilians without going through Mission Control.

Okay, granted, there were a few Ham Radio astronauts before him, and yes, dozens of others have sent emails and filed web reports and otherwise used the internet before while in orbit, but still.

This is one small step for Twitter, one giant leap for jackasses.

What Mike should do is just change his Facebook status to "circling," and leave it at that.

However, as I am a big space flight supporter and I think all astronauts are by default extremely awesome, I am prepared to give Mike a pass if he tweets just once: "Day 5: still smells like stale farts and sweaty Russians."

In other words, "Because we're lazy"

The National Post's Ron Nurwisah reports that:

"One of the reasons why journalists love Twitter is the immediacy of the microblogging platform. By looking at trending topics and using twitter search we can keep an eye on breaking news from around the world."

You Twitter Generation reporters have it so easy. Back in my day, journalists had to hang around phone booths and eavesdrop on conversations in order to stay on top of breaking news.

Sometimes, we'd wander around school yards and shopping malls and ask people "what are you doing?" in the hopes that we'd learn of a breaking development taking place in the Middle East or about a typhoon in Australia.

They say that at the Washington Post some of the reporters would hang around reading the news wires becuase they felt the source was more reliable and the method more efficient, but I don't believe it.

But how many characters does it take to spell hyperbole?

Technology visionary and renowned futurist Ashton Kutcher commented recently that Twitter:

"... is as significant and paradigm - shifting as the invention of Morse code, the telephone, radio, television or the personal computer."

and also that:

"Right now the word revolution is spelled with 140 characters."

Hmm.... Maybe.

But only if you spell it:

rrrrrrrrrrrrrreeeeeeeeeeeeeevvvvvvvvvvvvvvoooooooooooooo
lllllllllllllluuuuuuuuuuuuuuttttttttttttttiiiiiiiiiiiiiioooooooooooooo
nnnnnnnnnnnnnn

And for those wondering, here's how you say "what are you doing?" in Morse code:

.-- .... .- - / .- .-. . / -.-- --- ..- / -.. --- .. -. --. ..--..

and how you would Morse Tweet "I am thinking about having lunch":

.. / .- -- / - .... .. -. -.- .. -. --. / .- -... --- ..- - /
.... .- ...- .. -. --. / .-.. ..- -. -.-. ....

Queen Rania of Jordan sets up Twitter account so that she can tweet about the Pope's visit

I'll give you a minute to re-read that headline, before directing you here for more on this subject.

But really, there really isn't much more here to understand -- I think setting up a Twitter account is the kind of natural response you'd expect from any monarch whose nation is hosting the Pope.

Like many of us, Queen Rania was clearly holding back from Twitter until Papal conditions proved optimal, and I congratulate the Queen on her ability to now tweet freely, while so many of us still wait patiently for Benedict to pay us a visit so that we can join the tweeting throng.

CNN: Some observers say Twitter has become a hotbed of unnecessary hype and misinformation

You don't say?

A CNN.com journalist has achieved his goal of "tweeting" the London Marathon

And he didn't manage to run into anyone as he completed the race.

In other news, an ABC journalist has achieved his goal of swimming while checking his voicemail, and CBS Evening News anchor Katie Couric has announced her plans to do 3 hours of Pilates while selling collectors plates on eBay.

What I really need is a $16 PDF book on how to Twitter

Yeah, that ought to do it.

I'll put it right next to my copy of "The Canadian Guide to the Internet."

And I can print it out and mail it to my mom so that she can share it with her friends.

A couple weeks later there would be a handful of tweets popping up around town, pretty much along the lines of:

"how do i know if this is working? please tweet me back Anne if you can see this, sincerely Delores"

Pivotal!

Good lord.

A bunch of anonymous people post ridiculously brief and unverifiable stuff about massacres and plane crashes. Pivotal.

The New York Times ran some kind of visual depiction of what it looks like when a bunch of people tweet over top of each other during the Superbowl. I imagine it looks like a debate on policy at a Dungeons and Dragons convention. Pivotal!

Twitter founder Biz Stone.

Sorry. I had to stop and stare at that name for a few minutes. Who the hell is named "Biz Stone?"

Twitter founder Biz Stone goes on Colbert and declares that there will be business model behind all of this at some point, for "the messaging system that we didn't know we needed until we had it."

To which Colbert replied:"That sounds like the answer to a problem we didn't have until I invented the answer." PIVOTAL!!

Thank you Mr. Colbert. But I swear to god if you start tweeting I'm going to have to declare our love affair over.

"Why not tweet recipes?"

Because it's stupid?

Lucy Waverman just wrote a 500 word article explaining to news readers who will never use Twitter in their life, how you can write recipes using Twitter.

I am picturing it printed and posted on fridges across the nation.

more people are following Ashton Kutcher than the President

But then, the President hasn't had a chance to tweet since March 25, the slacker.

stop it with the "@whoever" crap

No seriously, I mean it.

Go ahead and keep it in your twittering if you must, but you leave that crap out of the rest of the internet when you're responding to someone in a comments section elsewhere, okay?

We don't tolerate your spelling "ur" instead of "you're" when you have access to a full keyboard in front of you, you little texting illiterates, and there's sure as hell no way that I'm going to let you start up with this @ crap spilling all over the place.

Ashton Kutcher has a million assholes following his every 140 characters (or whatever).

Way to go, Ashton!

You beat CNN in some kind of Twitter-off or something, which if I recall correctly was spun out of the publicity generated from that Twitter suicide note your wife got for some absolutely stupid reason or another, which in a normal universe would be a little bit awkward and possibly distasteful.

Ashton threw it down. CNN stepped up. A million jackasses admitted that they have nothing better to do but to be poised to consume Ashton's every word.

This is a slow clap for you, Ashton. Starting out slow. Building in rhythm as we all start clapping together, as the crowd lifts you over their shoulders and marches you around the stadium, a million morons strong, chanting "Ashton! Ashton! Ashton!"

And then halting abruptly as the crowd drops you on your kesiter as they reach for their phones at the same moment to tweet that they were holding Ashton Kutcher in the air, dude, right at this very minute!!!

The article asks: "As Ashton Kutcher becomes the first to collect 1 million followers on Twitter and Oprah Winfrey sends out her first tweet, tech observers are debating: Does Friday mark a new peak for the microblogging service? Or the beginning of its demise?"

I'm going to have to go ahead and root for "demise", and I am heartened in this regard because Oprah's first post was all in CAPS, like an embarrassing mom who just figured out how to forward you an email with a video of cat falling off of a couch.

Moriarty tweeted at a movie. I think. Or a couple dozen people did, anyway.

It was called TwitFlix, and I'm not entirely sure it was successful or not.

This is because I'm not entirely convinced Drew was really into the thing. Perhaps he was even a bit embarrassed to have had to document on his blog how he was affiliated with some kind of organized event where 50 jackasses were invited to sit and tweet during a movie. It just feels like a flailing grasp at being cool, something a bunch of middle aged marketing people would brainstorm on as being a way to capitalize on all of this Twitter business, somehow.

That, and my eyes tend to glaze over and skip over crap when I see the word "tweet", so it's possible that this was a successful and extremely pivotal event and I missed it.

Moriarty is a Twitter Enabler.

I can't do it. I really tried, but I just can't freaking twitter

I can't tweet, I really can't. I just can't tweet and I really just don't give a crap about everybody else tweeting either.

I swear to god, I gave it a shot, I swallowed down a huge bile ball of contempt and gave it a shot, but in the end I truly can't give a crap about posting or following all the navel gazers on Twitter.

I had considered that his could be a sympt0m of my age and out-of-touched-ness. But in the end, I have confirmed that my contempt is justified and that my reason for hating Twitter is due to the fact that I'm not a moron.

So I have no choice but to create this blog in order to ridicule Twitter, Twitterers, Tweets and all of that stupid Twitter crap.

The whole thing is a logical progression of the blogging, YouTube, and all the oother forms of public diary writing -- where everyone, apparently, has something vitally important to tell the world.

And yes, I realize I'm writing all of this down in a blog, smart guy, but I am immune to my own contempt.