A Second Opinion: Can Twitter lead to trouble?

Dear A Second Opinion,

I’ve noticed that I and many people on my Twitter feed say something on Twitter that they probably wouldn’t say in person, and definitely wouldn’t tell to a reporter (that would be against office policy!). I’m concerned about the reporters or publicity-seeking friends who follow me might be able to peg what I tweet on my boss. Am I being too uptight, or is this worry well-warranted?
 
Closeted Twitterer

CT,

Uptight? Yes. Alone? No. Smart to be thinking about a disaster before it happens? Definitely.

A colleague told me the other day that he has friends who keep two Twitter accounts — one that blasts more sterile messages to a broader audience and another, more stream-of-consciousness feed that reaches a smaller group of close friends. This is proof that there are other people out there who think their 140-character messages might somehow get them into trouble.

{mosads}I don’t mention that example to endorse the use of two Twitter accounts. If you really didn’t trust some of your followers, you could either block them or not even approve their following you to begin with. And — I know this sounds jaded, but that’s my job — what would make you think you could fully trust the followers of a “personal” Twitter account to keep your tweets private?

But I think this a cumbersome solution, and I also think it misses the root issue: Why aren’t you thinking before clicking “Tweet”?

I bet that if you took 10 seconds to review each of your tweets before you sent them out, you could determine whether your latest message has any potential for undesirable consequences. If it does, revise or delete it. Just because other people send out tweets  reflexively doesn’t mean you have to.

This is also not to say that I think you should hold in all of your complaints about your boss or your office. I’m just arguing that Twitter isn’t the best outlet for expressing your frustrations. Talk to a friend, call your mom, start a journal, lock yourself in a bathroom stall and shout at the toilet. These are all more trustworthy outlets (yes, even the toilet) for saying something you don’t want the whole world to know.

We’ve learned twice over the past few weeks that people’s flip words can get the best of them (Gen. Stanley McChrystal serving as the highest-profile example, and former Washington Post blogger Dave Weigel, if you followed that story, as another instance). So even though technology has provided us with all sorts of new ways to communicate, the adage still applies: Think before you speak.

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