Twitter Tips for Journalists

Using social media ethically

By Ann Babe

Photo by luc legay.

After a very successful 2011 for Twitter, which saw big booms in its user base, journalists are looking ahead to what’s in store for the popular social networking service in 2012.

The SMS giant reported a more than 80 percent increase in the number of registered users last year, according to PCMag.com, boasting a user base of more than 400 million at the end of 2011.

And there’s no sign Twitter’s success will slow in this lucky Year of the Dragon.

Twitter currently boasts more than 460 million users, according to statistics gathered by Mediabistro. Of those users, 127 million are considered active, meaning they log in at least once a month. Anticipating trends for 2012, Mediabistro estimates the number of Twitter users will reach half a billion by March of this year, and the number of active Twitter users will total 250 million by year’s end.

As Twitter’s popularity continues to explode, it’s no wonder that even the most old- fashioned journalists are considering joining the Twitterverse, in search of new and effective ways to find stories, connect with sources and keep track of their beats.

Indeed, Twitter is a powerful media tool that can help round out a reporter’s arsenal of traditional tricks. For example, a journalist can tap into Twitter to find a witness of a newsworthy event or a person with a particular experience. Or a journalist can use Twitter to gather ideas and information for stories by crowdsourcing.

But while the Twitterverse offers unprecedented opportunities for reporters to update their toolbox, it also presents new ethical challenges for upholding journalistic integrity. Faced with the unfamiliar territory of cyberspace, some journalists may be unclear about how to apply old journalistic standards to the new media trend of Twitter-based newsgathering, interviewing and fact-checking.

CIME interviewed Steve Buttry, a leading social journalist and longtime news writer, about the ethical concerns raised by Twitter journalism. Buttry offered some advice about how to use Twitter ethically.

According to Buttry, who is also director of community engagement and social media for Journal Register Company, journalism’s most important tenets should always remain the same, no matter where they’re put to the test, and that includes the Twitterverse.

“Nothing is more important than accuracy and verification. That doesn’t change with using Twitter,” Buttry said. “Journalists get deceived by dishonest sources or give undue credibility to sources who don’t know what they are talking about in in-person interviews and telephone interviews. And they make those errors on Twitter, too.”

So how can journalists take care to avoid making these errors on Twitter?

Buttry suggests reporters treat Twitter as they would any other form of media, adding that the same good journalistic sense that is applied to in-person, phone or email reporting should also be applied to Twitter reporting.

“I like John Paton's rules for employee use of social media,” Buttry said, referring to the CEO of Digital First Media, which operates Journal Register Company. “John is not saying that anything goes [for] Digital First journalists using social media, but that we don't have special rules for social media.”

According to Paton’s philosophy, journalists should use social media in the same ethical manner they would use any other tool of reportage.

“We don't have rules for use of email, telephone or notebooks. We expect journalists to identify themselves in any format and to behave honestly and ethically,” Buttry said. “That doesn't change with Twitter.”

At the heart of behaving honestly and ethically is making the effort to verify every fact, source and quote gathered in the Twitterverse and to ensure they’re used to honestly, accurately and fairly to convey the news story at hand.

Though “Twitter presents some challenges to verification,” Buttry said, good journalists will overcome these challenges and find ways to validate their research, even without stringent rules and regulations.

“Twitter … presents some great opportunities for verification: the opportunity to ask questions directly by replying, retweeting, direct-messaging and asking the source to call you on the phone; sometimes-deep context of previous tweets and their links; bios and related links; verified accounts; location-enabled tweets,” Buttry added.

While some social journalists like Buttry and Paton advocate giving reporters the trust and freedom to make their own ethical decisions with regard to Twitter, many news organizations disagree and choose to regulate reporters’ decision making with policies and rules.

The Oregonian, for example, issued a controversial Twitter rule late last year, telling its reporters to view retweets not as quotes, but as endorsements. The Associated Press, too, has social media guidelines for its employees, which are updated regularly.

The AP’s most recent Social Media Guidelines for AP Employees, revised in January 2012, includes specific Twitter guidelines for issues like following users, deleting tweets, correcting tweets and retweeting.

While it’s debatable whether guidelines like these are absolutely necessary, they can surely be helpful in certain situations. For journalists who are new to Twitter, or who feel uneasy about how to tread the Twitterverse ethically, taking a look at the social media guidelines of several different news groups can prove useful. Journalists don’t have to be restricted by the information they find, but they can build their knowledge and arm themselves with some practical ethical tips.

After all, Twitter isn’t going away any time soon, so the more quickly and effectively journalists know how to use it, the better the news world will be for it.