Twitter Gonna Kill Somebody!

This whole insta-communication thing has always been kind of suspect to me. Gone are the days of not answering your phone or ignoring contact with people, regardless how irritating they may be. Case in point, there's at least 5 ways to get in touch with me, if anyone really wanted to reach me. Oddly enough, I don't even have a house phone & know very few people under the age of 40 that do. My little brother hipped me to that "on-the-go" way of life some years back. I thought it was the dumbest idea ever. The only people who shouldn't have house phones are those without houses. Eventually though, my wife & I succumbed, & realized we eliminated a bill. But the trade-off for one less bill isn't necessarily worth being available for comment at all times of the day.

Which leads my to my next point. Say, you did something to me that warranted some immediate attention paying. First, I'll call you. If that doesn't take, I'll text you. Still no dice? I'll send a polite email, & include the fact that I've tried reaching you to no avail. If need be the big guns come out, per se. I'm hitting myspace & FaceBook with an ass load of things to say, knowing damn well that you won't be the only one to read them. This would be the social networking equivalent of DEFCON 3. Privacy is no more an option at this point, seeing as though I've decided to take it to the "streets". My last, & most audacious resort would be to hit you on the Twitter, for the world to see. Now, we're at DEFCON 4, & with a limited amount of shoving, I could make you a trend. Yeah, a trend. Thats when the users make fun of a person/place/thing even if they have no idea why, it just becomes fun & cool to the popular & anonymous alike. Papoose, Bow Wow & Ace Hood have all allen victims of said trending, & it wasn't pretty.
[tony's note: seem as if rapper fabolous has become the spokesperson for dissing other rappers on twitter. i called it a couple weeks back on "what happens in las vegas, goes on twitter". just want my credit....]

There's an incident right now involving blogger Combat Jack (www.daily-math.com) & radio personality Peter Rosenberg of Hot 97fm (the place where Hip Hop lives). Jack took sourly to some thing's Rosenberg said during the morning talk show, & decided to give him a piece of his mind via Twitter. & to think, 10 years ago, you'd have to wait until you caught a nigga slipping at the grocery store. Whatever Jack said was far from insulting, or even insinuating, he merely wanted to make a point in regards to Quadaffi's speech at the UN meeting. Rosenberg, obviously a man of many words, hence his profession, tweeted back to Combat Jack:

"Ill slap the shit out of you in front of ur kids..."

Now, any other interaction between the two is irrelevant. At this juncture, Rosenberg had crossed the sand line Combat drew in the proverbial sand. [tony's note: proverbial is like my most favorite word ever.] Not only did this whole episode not begin with any threatening language or chance for violence, but you don't wave threats in front of a (Black) man, AND involve his children without expecting quite the backlash. Keep in mind, a Black man who does raise his kids is naturally going to be extra territorial over them. & the fact that it was on Twitter, where possibly thousands witnessed the occurrence, only fuels the fires.

Under normal circumstances, Jack, a New Yorker, would have driven to Rosenberg's place of business, also in New York, & the two could've swiftly gotten to the bottom of such blatant douche nozzleness. What made this not "normal", was the fact that Combat Jack is a lawyer, & Rosenberg knows that. Had Jack been in a different place in life, God only knows what may have happened. Well, I have an idea & it would've most likely involved jail time for one, hospital time for the other.

These days, cats like Fabolous go around teasing lesser familiar rappers, breathing new life into the phrase "cyber-bully". Who's to say that one of these not-as-successful rappers decides to make a name for themselves? Back in the days, if the beef were that insistent, one would go to the nearest venue the other was performing at, wait around until the show was over & confront them. No emotional outburst distributed throughout a social network. If "fuck you" is what you wanted to say, you'd first have to possess the balls to say it to someone's face. I'll admit that, as a whole, we've become more aggressive & less confrontational, society-wise. All you need is an ISP address & you can go around spewing as much distaste as your hateful heart desires.

Remember that girl that everyone teased & bullied & humiliated online, who eventually brokedown & committed suicide? Yeah, something like that, but only murder.

Eventually, all that will change though because, & quote me, Twitter's gonna get somebody killed.

**Take a moment & pray for my big homie Dallas Penn. & yourselves, while you're at it.**

What Happens In Las Vegas, Goes On Twitter.

“Yo I'm at [club] Rehab in Vegas.. T-Pain is DJ'ing. Sayin Fuck Jay Z, he old, blah blah.. guess its backlash from D.O.A..”-Fabolous via Twitter, 9/05

Damn. Fabolous is in this club last Saturday, undoubtedly surrounded by all types of females, even a choice selection of guys if he likes sausage with his eggs, & THIS is what he chooses to lay on his followers? I'm not the most "out-there" dude, & I'm not all in the streets with mine, but if I were, I don't think I'd be reporting on the movements &/or goings-on of another guy with my transmitter. I'd probably be sneaking up-skit pictures & posting them on Myspace & Facebook. Like a real man.

This smells like Perez Hilton to me. Not shis perfume, but shis feminine antics that always land shim in the middle of pointless bullshit, just to stay in people's mouths (no pun intended)(okay, maybe a little bit).

Anybody who hasn't been under a rock for the last 3 or so years knows about Twitter. If you have been sleeping beneath a boulder, It's like a global text message. However pointless, it's extremely popular among folks who swear that they are so important that their every thought is worth yelling off of the proverbial mountain top. It's also a great way to notify strangers of your whereabouts, but that's for another day.

“Yo the DJ is doin a Jay-Z set.. D.O.A., kingdom come, run this town, heart of the city, h to the izzo, amillie free..T-Pain somewhere in here,”-Fabolous via Twitter, 9/05

Was Fabolous purposely twitter-telling on T-Pain? I would say no, because this wasn't a formal, one-on-one cell phone call to Jay-Z's private steam room. This was more like the equivalent of one running to a group of people during breaktime & saying "Owwwwww, guess what y'all? Nevermind, don't guess, I'll tell you!". So, in essence, what he did do was dry-snitch the situation, like any good gossiper could. Except, unlike the handful of morons that would normally be gathered around a water cooler or lunch table, he digitally broadcasted it to the hundreds of people who consider Fab a celebrity. Who, in turn, will pass it on to the thousands of people who consider Jay-Z a god.

At the most, Jay-Z will dismiss T-Pain's remarks as jealous flails & shots at his upcoming album for publicity's sake. But, if Jay's not even responding to The Game, who's been calling him an "old faggot" on 3 different continents so far, then I highly doubt he'll go in on Robot Man. Honestly, I wouldn't mind seeing Jigga slap that porch-monkey ass top hat off of those dingy dreadlocks, but for the record, T-Pain looks like he would beat Jay up. Tae-bo or none. & at the least, Fabolous was attempting to get a few more record sales before the public forgets his last record ever came out. Personally, I would've gone a more masculine route (like jumping on stage & yelling "Fuck you T-Punk, nigga this Brooklyn!!), as opposed to spreading rumors, but Loso stopped being "gangsta" in 2003. &, sometimes I forget that this is the era of the emo-thug; bad attitudes & testosterone have been replaced with denim leatards & livestreamed slap-boxing matches. If I'm not mistaken, Fab was wearing skinny jeans way before your favorite rapper was. He's trendy like that.

I can't see the future, but I expect very soon that entertainers will begin moonlighting as celebrity gossip bloggers. How much more up-close & personal can one get to Mariah Carey than in the bathroom stall next to her? & there's literally hundreds of people who would love to know how stank Kristoff St. John's farts are. I don't know any personally, but I'm not a people person to begin with, so that's not saying much. TMZ created a whole other culture with their kamikazee paparazzi, so it's only right that it's now taken to the next level. Twitter is Pandora's Box, folks. If you don't get that, read a book.

Celebrity-on-celebrity twitter-telling is on the move, y'all. Famous people officially have no one left to trust.