# Twitter is now a legit news source from random people? **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [December 10, 2017, 7:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/twitter-is-now-a-legit-news-source-from-random-people/804134 "2017-12-10T19:15:33Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 6\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Bijou\_Drains](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bijou_drains/32/2814_2.png) [@Bijou\_Drains](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bijou_Drains)\ **Post date:** [December 10, 2017, 7:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/twitter-is-now-a-legit-news-source-from-random-people/804134/1 "2017-12-10T19:15:33Z")
All the time I see articles that are nothing more than a compilation of tweets from random people . example here [Twitter erupts with United States men soccer team jokes as team fails to qualify for World Cup – New York Daily News](http://www.nydailynews.com/sports/soccer/twitter-erupts-usmnt-jokes-team-fails-reach-world-cup-article-1.3554774) Is the media so lazy now that all they do is fire up a browser to get “news?” ---
**Author:** ![Asuka](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/dec6dc/32.png) [@Asuka](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Asuka)\ **Post date:** [December 10, 2017, 7:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/twitter-is-now-a-legit-news-source-from-random-people/804134/2 "2017-12-10T19:23:33Z")
Yeah, I hate “news” articles where they find 3 random tweets and craft a narrative around them. Something like “Bigots up-in-arms over new Wonder Woman trailer!” and then when you check twitter yourself the three tweets in the article at pretty much the only tweets opposing the movie and they only have 3 retweets each. ---
**Author:** ![Bijou\_Drains](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bijou_drains/32/2814_2.png) [@Bijou\_Drains](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bijou_Drains)\ **Post date:** [December 10, 2017, 7:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/twitter-is-now-a-legit-news-source-from-random-people/804134/3 "2017-12-10T19:25:05Z")
if you google the phrase “twitter erupts” you get 13,000,000 hits ---
**Author:** ![ThelmaLou](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/thelmalou/32/390_2.png) [@ThelmaLou](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ThelmaLou)\ **Post date:** [December 10, 2017, 8:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/twitter-is-now-a-legit-news-source-from-random-people/804134/4 "2017-12-10T20:44:42Z")
Apparently so, and it absolutely infuriates me! I’ve rewatched _All the President’s Men_ several times recently, and for reporters to have to go through the amount of documentation and verification that Woodward and Bernstein had to is unheard of today. Probably even at the _Washington Post_. In that account of breaking the Watergate story, Ben Bradlee was waaaay skeptical of what “Woodstein” were coming up with long into the investigation and demanded all kinds of backup. And that’s the way it should be. But with the advent of the 24-hour news cycle (which really started when CNN covered the first Gulf War around the clock in 1999), scooping the other news media becomes every outlet’s main goal. And with social media, especially Twitter, and ESPECIALLY the constant use of Twitter by thump, verification is out the window. Now anyone can make headlines. And anyone does. And it plays right into the dumbing down of the consumers of social media. (Sadly, most of them don’t know who they are.) ---
**Author:** ![Procrustus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/procrustus/32/2994_2.png) [@Procrustus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Procrustus)\ **Post date:** [December 10, 2017, 8:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/twitter-is-now-a-legit-news-source-from-random-people/804134/5 "2017-12-10T20:49:23Z")
Quoting tweets, including the President’s, should be illegal. ---
**Author:** ![up\_the\_junction](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/f1d935/32.png) [@up\_the\_junction](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/up_the_junction)\ **Post date:** [December 10, 2017, 8:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/twitter-is-now-a-legit-news-source-from-random-people/804134/6 "2017-12-10T20:53:54Z")
I see my circle of friends on social media drifting away. I do still check it a couple of times a week but haven’t put anything on SM for several months. The whole politics thing is shrill and stupid, not even from _friends_ but organisatins like the NYT and The New Yorker. So infantile and partisan, there’s no point.