Gilad Lotan, Erhardt Graeff, Mike Ananny, Devin Gaffney, Ian Pearce, and, Danah Boyd are all authors of the article called, The Revolutions Were Tweeted: Information Flows During the 2011 Tunisian and Egyptian Revolutions. Lotan is VP of Research and Development at Social Flow in New York City. Graeff is a Research Assistant at MIT Center for Civic Media, and his focus is in Web Ecology Project. Ananny is an Assistant Professor at USC’s Annenberg School for Communication and Journalism where he researches the public significance of systems for networked journalism through Microsoft Research. Gaffney and Pearce is a halfway programmer and both study Web Ecology Project. Lastly, Boyd is a Senior Researcher at Microsoft Research and a Research Assistant Professor in Media, Culture, and Communication at New York University.
Official Twitter Logo, Source: Twitter
In the article, The Revolutions Were Tweeted: Information Flows During the 2011 Tunisian and Egyptian Revolutions, Lotan and the other researchers analyzed the network assembly and distribution of news on Twitter during the Tunisian and Egyptian Revolutions as seen through the different information flows. They examined this dispersion through bloggers, journalist, activist and mainstream media outlets, and analyzed the importance of Twitter, and other social networking sites through the spread of steadfast information across the world.
After evaluating this article I found that the flow of information sharing on Twitter is a 2 step flow theory, by Katz Lazarsfeld. By this, activist and journalist are posting tweets or re-tweet important information, and it serves as a primary source of information where then bloggers and other main stream media outlets gather their information and either re-tweeting or dispersing the information. By looking at these different flows, they can identify they key characteristics: who starts an information flow, what types of actors are involved in the flow, how many users participate, and which actor types appear to be more successful in spreading information. We then divide each flow into sub-flows and analyze recurring patterns among actor types. During the Tunisian uprising, Twitter was a place where users used a set of practices and established relationships that were then further developed during the Egyptian revolution.
In the end, research found that the content had become more of a topic and discussion due to Twitter and tweeting. Twitter is a great medium for people to gather and share important information, and for knowledge to be widely disperse throughout the world today. It is easier today for people today to tweet or reading a quick 140 characteristics tweet regarding something important going on in rather than hearing the information face to face or using other mediums. Our society is lazy, and using these types of mediums like Twitter is a fast, quick and reliable way for people to receive information.
I see your point, but I don’t think people use Twitter because they are lazy but rather because Twitter is, as you put it, “a fast, quick, and reliable way for people to receive [and send] information.” Lazy people passively watch TV, listen to the radio, or talk to their neighbor rather than reading and sending text messages all day.