Breaking Tweets: a new way to write stories?

Posted by Marion Geiger on April 2, 2009 at 2:30 PM

Breaking Tweets is a website launched early this year to create a system of filtering through breaking news tweets so as to compile a story out of them, using the feeds as quotes.

An editor writes a short introduction to a story topic and then tweeters will send in their opinions, eyewitness media, or related links. The 28 editors at Breaking Tweets will then organize the most interesting feeds in an order that makes sense.

"It's a new type of journalism. I haven't seen anyone doing anything remotely close to this besides Global Voices, but they focus more on blogs. Breaking Tweets changes the practice because it focuses on editing the Web. There is so much clutter out there but it takes it all and seeks to make sense of it," said Craig Kanalley, creator of Breaking Tweets, in an interview with BeatBlogging.org,"we do the best we can with that and at times we have to discount a certain tweet because it doesn't appear to be authentic."

Although it is called Breaking Tweets, Kanalley says it's not a website focused on breaking the news like BNO News, or Nyouse.com which aim to pass story tips and newsworthy topics directly on to journalists.

Source: BeatBlogging.org