When you delete an unsightly tweet from your Twitter feed, it’s gone for good, right?
Wrong.
Several United States politicians learned this the hard way this summer following the launch of a new watchdog website, Politwoops. The project follows the official Twitter accounts of members of Congress, President Barack Obama and numerous presidential candidates to track when they delete tweets and to record the elapsed time before removal.
Politwoops’ archiving system has already accumulated thousands of tweets since its May unveiling by The Sunlight Foundation, an Internet-based nonprofit organization with a goal of holding government officials accountable. Deleted tweets range from those containing minor typos to embarrassingly honest revelations — but unfortunately for the politicians, their attempts to permanently delete their messages are just too little too late.
I read about Politwoops this summer when it attracted the attention of news outlets across the country and the website immediately interested me. It illustrates how, as we’ve discussed in class, nothing “deleted” on the Internet ever disappears permanently.
This topic is revisited often. For example, the Library of Congress announced in April 2010 it acquired the entire Twitter archive, meaning every tweet sent since Twitter’s inception — and every tweet for, presumably, the rest of history — will be digitally archived, regardless if it’s deleted soon after.
The thought makes some people uneasy. Others, especially those who enjoy scrutinizing public officials, are overwhelmingly in favor of websites like Politwoops. As a journalist, I’m in the latter category, and I praise The Sunlight Foundation’s initiative to keep Congress in check.
Anyone utilizing social media, regardless if they’re a politician, should use strict discretion when determining what he or she publicly posts. Information unveiled on the Internet is permanent, despite the availability of the misleading “delete” button. Instead of tweeting carelessly and then deleting offensive tweets as a form of reactive damage control, social media users should be proactive and follow a simple rule: think before you tweet.
And if you’re still not convinced, head over to Politwoops and check out its up-to-the-minute RSS feed. It contains plenty of great examples of what happens when you don’t use discretion before hitting the “tweet” button.
Tags: delete, Library of Congress, politicians, Politwoops, professionalism, social media, Twitter
5:38 pm - 9-8-2012
I think this is great idea. It kind of shows us an inside look at prominent people’s mistakes. It gives us an idea of who people are behind closed doors, simply because they messed up a tweet. I’m definitely thinking this is going to cause people to start thinking even more about what they say before they say it.
11:38 am - 9-10-2012
This isn’t something that I realized was out there but makes perfect sense that it is. I think you can really see a politician’s, or other prominent public figures’, true colors through deleted tweets. Assuming it’s not just a simple typo/grammatical mistake, if the politician really tweeted it themselves, I think it’s safe to say that’s how they really felt, at least at the time. When they delete it, it’s probably that much more important to their public image.
Of course, a service like this will make a PR firm’s job that much harder, because just cleaning up a twitter feed with a quick delete button will not fix the problem.
6:32 pm - 9-10-2012
I think Politwoops is a great illustration of the idea that one must think carefully before they post anything online. However, as a watchdog mechanism in itself Politwoops seems a little closer to sensationalist cable news than an actual tool to keep politicians in check. I read through about ten pages of the site, and didn’t come across anything particularly hard-hitting or insightful. There are a lot of grammatical errors and silly slip-ups – such as Congressmen Bilirakis advertising a sublease – but it mostly seems like fluff; distractions from what these politicians are actually doing. I don’t particularly care that Congresswoman Norton claims democrats will “take care of Romeny/Ryan”; I care about how she is going to vote. I also wonder how many of these twoops are actually made by politicians. I have a friend who works in the office of a representative and all of her social media is written by a press secretary.