Twitter to Start Closing Accounts That Use Poor Grammar
San Francisco, CA – Less than a week after purging a large number of spam accounts, Twitter has now set its sights on the English language, as they announced that effective next week, they will begin deactivating accounts that use poor grammar.
According to Twitter founder, Jack Dorsey, “First of all, let me be clear in saying that this has nothing to do with trying to shrink the size of the Twitter community. It’s more to assuage my own guilt, as I’ve been feeling awful that my creation seems to be encouraging lazy grammar. When I first started Twitter, I pictured a place where people could post eloquent sonnets and partake in articulate conversations that spanned the globe, not a place where people would commit unspeakable offenses against the English language. I realize that some of you will blame the 140 character maximum, but that policy is in practice to encourage people to write succinctly, not take the easy way out with abbreviations and poor grammar.”
To enforce the new policy, Twitter has chosen to adopt a points system where users committing grammatical infractions will be docked points. After their “total points docked” reaches a certain threshold, their account will be deactivated. The specific point values have not yet been released, but according to sources familiar with the matter, spelling and proper verb conjugation rank atop the list, with misusage of “there, their, they’re, your, you’re” being grounds for instant deactivation.
Word of the impending policy spread like wildfire across the twitter-sphere, as the hashtags “#grammarpolice” and “#grammersux” ranked number one and number two on Twitter’s Trending Topic list. The general reaction was almost entirely negative, as only a few bookworms and poindexters came out in support of the idea. Users also moved quickly to organize a “boicott” of Twitter that is scheduled to happen the same day the new policy is enacted.
In spite of all the outrage and anger, the NEA, has come out in favor of the proposal. They claim that due to twitter and text messaging, students’ ability to use correct grammar has reached an all time low. NEA president Dennis Van Roekel told Beagle Reporters, “We are very confident that this recent policy enacted by Twitter will help kids to start doing good in English.”
Users looking to keep their accounts from being deactivated are encouraged to visit Twitter.com and download the “Official Twitter Style Guide”.
[...] offenses against the English language,” said Jack Dorsey, Founder of Twitter in a blog post by Phil Buckridge entitled Twitter to Start Closing Accounts That Use Poor [...]