Mashable Hysterical Over Twitter Outage

As you may or may not have noticed, Twitter.com disappeared for about an hour last night. Their DNS records were apparently compromised by someone claiming to be the (previously unheard-of) “Iranian Cyber Army”. The DNS entry, which essentially tells your web browser where to find individual sites, was apparently changed by some mischief makers to point to the wrong place. Some users saw a message from the “Army”, while others simply couldn’t access the site. It was back to normal in an hour or so.

It is unknown whether the “Army” acted in response to my repeated exclamations that “Twitter Must Die“.

It’s not the first time Twitter has gone down, though it’s certainly the most spectacular. Unfortunately, the crew at Mashable.com, who (as we’ve repeatedly noted, are obsessed with Twitter), reacted to the outage with Hindenburg-style hysterics.

Ben Parr, Mashable’s intrepid co-editor and repeatedly failed entrepreneur according to his own web site, breathlessly reported that Twitter had been hacked (a statement he later tweaked for accuracy purposes). Parr stated:

For one of the world’s most popular websites to be compromised and taken down, even for a few minutes, is a big problem. This type of thing should never happen, regardless of who is to blame.

You tell ‘em Ben! This should never happen! Twitter should never make the rookie mistakes you made with your own start-ups.

In his follow-up piece, Parr grew far more hysterical (and repeated the inaccurate, irresponsible “hacking” charge). Get a load of this:

We’re still in shock over what has just transpired. Twitter was just hacked.

…

Little compares to what has happened tonight. Even if it was a third-party DNS attack, Twitter still gets the black eye.

This is unacceptable for one of the world’s top 20 most-visited websites. There needs to be accountability for this situation (no matter if it’s within Twitter or within a third party), and a more detailed explanation is warranted. Twitter also needs to find a way to assure that this never happens again.

This is a tragedy beyond compare! It is unacceptable! Something must be done!

To their credit, some more intelligent Mashable readers called out Parr for over-reacting and being absurdly dramatic. But most of his readers joined right in:

Who knows if the hackers got our passwords and personal information?

I’m thinking about deleting my Twitter after this….It seems so unsafe now!

Do these people have all my info???

What will I do with out Twitter?

Can’t connect either from venezuela… There’s a hole in my heart and is killing me forever (8).. and is only being there for 30 min now =|,

I am having withdrawal symptoms already. Twitter down, not good :[

God Damn those fuckers, and Twitter has got to do something about the God Damn security on its website… damn it I am pissed off

PRAISE JESUS. TWITTER’S BACK.

Ben, you and your readers need to get outside and get some fresh air. You’ll feel better, I promise.

Get Off My Lawn! (Again)

…or, Another Post About Twitter.

This time, courtesy of Mediapost.com’s Will Akerlof, who says it very nicely:

Twits: Why Twitter Won’t Change Marketing

Mashable: Off the Deep End

I wrote in January that the popular web news site mashable.com was obsessed with Twitter. Since I wrote that piece, they’ve only gotten crazier, though at least they’ve become a bit more honest about it by putting not one but two huge “Twitter” buttons at the top of their site.

Since January, they’ve also changed their tag-line from “All That’s New on the Web” to “The Social Media Guide”. Its a smart move, I’ll give them that; instead of a shotgun approach aimed at the entire web, they’re focusing on the niche that is currently getting the most attention. That’s one of the side benefits of having a name that means nothing: if they decided to cover cake recipes starting tomorrow, they could do it.

Another change seems to be including the advertising pitch right in their “About” page. Usually the general public doesn’t see its own demographic pitch, but Mashable puts it right there for the its readers to see:

Mashable will put your brand in front of the most tech-savvy early adopters, venture capitalists, entrepreneurs, influencers, Web 2.0 aficionados and technology journalists. Mashable is also popular with bloggers and members of social networking sites — an increasingly influential demographic.

Wow – I’m impressed by how influential and tech-savvy I am, but I must say I feel a little dirty being used for my demographics.

Anyway, the purpose of today’s post is not to simply slag Mashable in any way possible (for example by posting links to hilariously bad early versions of their site, all of which pitch the latest “hot” web 2.0 startups that have since shriveled and died). No, today’s purpose is to simply point out how far off the deep end Mashable has gone into Twitter obsession.

At least in the early days, Pete Cashmore & Co. had the sense not to put all their eggs in one basket – they seemingly pitched any site that sent them a press release. But now it seems they’ve decided that Twitter is the future, period. Unfortunately, that makes it tough to run a web site, since there’s only so much to say about a service that sends tiny messages between users. So let’s take a look at the latest “social media news” according to Mashable:

Flirt140: Can You Find Your Dream Date Via Twitter?

Tweetmeme Shows Off the Future of Twitter Search

Tweet Street: 7 Extraordinary Twitter Uses in the Home

OneRiot Speeds Up Twitter Search and Adds Digg to the Mix

Scamming Twitter Trends: This Needs To Be Fixed

ThreadedTweets: Turn Your Twitter into a Realtime Conversation

TwitterJobSearch: Find a Job on Twitter

Literary Tweets: 100+ of the Best Authors on Twitter

The Retweeting Movement Adds Some Powerful New Tools

Please – anyone who gives a crap about about any of the above topics, write me and let me know why.

Of course, if Mashable is wrong, and Twitter is not the future of the internet and the next evolutionary step of mankind, they can always change their focus again. But as long as there’s an Archive.org, some of us will be here to throw it back in their faces. Sorry Pete, you deserve it for feeding into (and feeding from) the self-perpetuating “hotness” vortex of a phenomenon that is destined to end up here.