Let Twitter twits stew in their own juice

http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2012/jul/31/twitter-twits-tom-daley-ignore

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Where in the real world do Olympians, politicians and celebrities mingle with the sad and the bad, the attention-seeking and the hyperactive? (And I'm not just talking about journalists.) The answer is Twitter. The social networking site has broken down barriers that continue to exist on the streets. There are no limos, security guards or personal assistants. This communication is truly horizontal and to be celebrated.

It also brings perils, as the various sagas taking place during London 2012 have demonstrated. At the latest count, two athletes, one Greek and one Swiss, have been sent home for sending tweets deemed racist; one teenager has been visited by the police for apparently threatening the diver Tom Daley, and a British journalist has been frozen out of Twitter altogether for having the temerity to challenge an American television network.

True to form, all these incidents have been chewed over with the usual mix of rage, portentousness and crassness that is the hallmark of the medium. For every Tweet praising the authorities for knocking on the door of a 17-year-old who invoked the death of Daley's father while expressing his fury at the diver's failure to make it on to the medal rostrum, others have suggested that the response is over the top. Equally significant has been the mob reaction to the original offence.

So what should the correct response be to tweets that are offensive, rude, disgusting, ill-informed (choose your own adjective to express your outrage)? Perhaps the best guidance comes from the judiciary. Last Friday the high court's decision to overturn the conviction of Paul Chambers, the man who sent a bad taste tweet threatening to blow up an airport, finally brought some wisdom to the debate. It also helps to clarify the law and to set precedent.

A tweet is more pub talk than publication. But what about the argument that it provides the oxygen of publicity that the school playground or the bar stool at the local does not? It does, but only if you encourage it. Imagine you stumble across some 17-year-old boys sitting on a park bench, alcopops in hand, and you overhear some obnoxious chat. You could confront them – and some would – or shrug your shoulders, say that one day they'll grow up, and hope that their peers will knock some sense into them.

Is it the job of the police to ensure that everyone speaks well of everyone else? Or as the free speech campaigner Kenan Malik puts it: "There are difficult questions about how, as a community, we challenge abuse, and about the fact that we often do not challenge such abuse but let it stand. But the fact that there are difficult questions here does not mean that such abuse should be a matter for the criminal law."

I am surprised whenever I see people re-tweeting or replying to people who have said something disparaging about them. I have always thought it best to leave the green ink brigade to stew. This 17-year-old seemed desperate to increase his followers, to be noticed. For all Daley's understandable upset and anger, why on earth did he engage him? A barrage then ensued, with threats to "drown" Daley. Such things should never be taken lightly, but does this constitute realistic incitement? Had Daley not taken the bait, almost nobody would have noticed his ludicrous remarks and the world would have been a better place as a result.

As some have pointed out, why did Twitter freeze the account of the journalist Guy Adams, and not those of assorted cranks and screamers who inhabit the space every day? Adams's crime was to have posted a string of tweets attacking NBC as "utter bastards" for failing to air the opening ceremony to viewers on the west coast of the US, who had to watch it on a six-hour delay. He then published the corporate – not private – email of the executive responsible for the coverage. Twitter immediately froze Adams's twitter handle and told him he had violated the site's rules preventing the posting of private and confidential users' information. Legally the argument is laughable, suggesting that Twitter has moved into the corporate camp, where favours to clients matter more than the openness of the forum.

Twitter is the perfect medium for connecting people of all cultures, for disseminating information. It has played a valuable role in holding the powerful to account (as Adams was seeking to do). If people wish to use it to highlight the misdeeds of others, they should be praised, and followed. If they wish to misuse it to express their own flawed personalities, perhaps it is best to leave them to it – in miserable isolation.