Fads come and go, but Twitter is forever.
For all of those out there who feel they have contributed naught to society, think again. Those alcohol-induced tweets from last night now have a place in history within the same establishment that houses the private library of Thomas Jefferson and the rough draft of the Constitution.
The country’s oldest federal cultural institution, the Library of Congress, recently tweeted “Library to acquire ENTIRE Twitter archive — ALL public tweets, ever, since March 2006! Details to follow.”
Apparently there is a lot of cultural and historical significance to be detailed in 140 characters or less. Barack Obama announced his presidential victory via Twitter. The controversy surrounding the outcome of the Iranian elections was brought to international attention through the social networking Web site.
The Library of Congress is the prestigious research arm of the nation and largest library in the world. Its mission aims to “sustain and preserve a universal collection of knowledge and creativity for future generations,” according to its Web site.
The Twitter project is one of many ventures the library has embarked upon for its Web archiving project, which began in 2000, and now boasts over 167 terabytes of information. The acquisition means that every public tweet since the company’s 2006 debut will be digitally archived for future generations to access.
According to a Washington Post interview with Matt Raymond, communications director for the library, “Not only is it the kind of born digital record we’re looking to keep, but it is directly related to the cultural and historical heritage of the country. It’s just a new type of technology about people documenting our society and what life is like at this time in history.”
Twitter has its respective merits in an unprecedented age of information technology. After all, there are over 55 million tweets sent out every day, according to The New York Times. From a sociological perspective, Twitter is a goldmine. Never before in human history has there been such an expansive flow of information from ordinary citizens on a global scale. The library’s decision to preserve all of Twitter’s archives will provide a different kind of historical record that is not only representative of prominent figures in our era but also the average ones.
With our generation accumulating more data about ourselves than any previous to date, we need to take our willful disclosure of everything that we do with a grain of salt.
We live in an age where new technologies have brought the world closer than ever. The social networking boom that was the genesis of Twitter has enabled us to share any random musing on any random subject instantly to a vast audience of which few can comprehend.
It will be interesting to see the kind of effect the Twitter archives will have. However, it’s not only our achievements that will tweet on — even those embarrassing or tell-all tweets of regret are now part of history. So, for your legacy’s sake, be wary of what you tweet — it’s those thoughts that will be chronicled forever.
Reach Alana at alana.arbuthnot@asu.edu
