The Twitter debate

The infamous Kanye incident at the VMA’s on Sunday now seems like old news. The fact that it’s still in the news (and that I’m writing about it) has got to be annoying to more people than just me, right?

But I just read on Boston.com that President Obama called Kanye West a ‘jackass’ during chatter before a CNBC and ABC interview in Wall Street on Monday, which was then reported on Twitter by three ABC journalists as they listened in.

The fact that this is even in the news, despite the face most can agree Kanye is a jackass, is because it brings up the debate between journalistic ethics and the new media such as Twitter. The digital age has speed up so quickly and has become all-encompassing; there are no rules for journalists to be governed by.

Twitter is perfect for this sort of information. It’s interesting, it needs no explanation, and it’s about someone everyone knows. The perfect tweet. And yet, it came from a professional journalist who should have known the President was speaking off the record…

I imagine that we’ll be seeing more and more of these as Twitter grows in popularity. Although many might see this as the end of journalism as we know it (no rules, no boundaries), this is the perfect opportunity to create new ethics. Journalism needs to expand and grow as Web 2.0 (3.0?) take over.

Who doesn’t want to hear Obama calling Kanye a jackass? Of course, this isn’t really news either. Journalists know the difference between off-the-record and on. And this should be no different for tweeting. Presidents, public officials, and businesses alike have for years felt protected behind the ‘off-the-record’ comments, and just because we have access to post a comment for all the world to read seconds later, this does not mean we as journalists should – or can for that matter.

The fact is ABC had to apologize to the White House and CNBC and the tweets were deleted from Twitter after about an hour of being posted. But the damage has been done and the debate will continue.