Well if you work for the august institution that is the New York Times, the answer to that question is most definitely no when it comes to describing the comments posted on the microblogging service Twitter.
And that is the law as laid down by the Grey Lady’s standards editor, Phil Corbett.
In a leaked memo obtained by theawl.com, Mr Corbett sets out his reasons for not using the moniker that has become accepted parlance in many a geek’s every day chatter:
“Some social-media fans may disagree, but outside of ornithological contexts, ‘tweet’ has not yet achieved the status of standard English. And standard English is what we should use in news articles.”
“Except for special effect, we try to avoid colloquialisms, neologisms and jargon. And ‘tweet’ – as a noun or a verb, referring to messages on Twitter – is all three. Yet it has appeared 18 times in articles in the past month, in a range of sections.”
“Of course, new technology terms sprout and spread faster than ever. And we don’t want to seem paleolithic. But we favor established usage and ordinary words over the latest jargon or buzzwords.”
Interestingly enough, Mr Corbett also notes that while the word is bandied about by the technically savvy crowd of the day, who knows how long it will be around for.
“Someday, ‘tweet’ may be as common as ‘e-mail’. Or another service may elbow Twitter aside next year, and ‘tweet’ may fade into oblivion,” said Mr Corbett.
Truth be told, Mr Corbett is just not a big fan of the actual word itself.
“Of course, it doesn’t help that the word itself seems so inherently silly,” he wrote.
So what does Twitter have to say about the whole affair. Here is their official response, posted on Twitter natch from their head PR guy, Sean Garrett:
The link takes you to an article by Neiman Labs that looks at the 50 words that New York Times readers looked up the most. Count how many Twitter used in its reply.
Meanwhile reaction on Twitter to the whole Tweet ban gives food for thought.
@RonSupportsYou Is this NY Times decision crazy?
@AndyStettler Another “titan” thinks he can control the crowd?
There is some support for the move.
@natalidelconte: I gotta say, I support this. I hate that word.
@eric_andersen tweet is “a bit too cutesy?” I’m w/NYT, tweet is “inherently silly”
What do you think? Is it silly? Should it be banned? And what would you replace it with?
