What is Twitter??

It seems like a new craze is sweeping the nation: Twitter. But I really don't have a good grasp of what it is. It's changing facebook, it's allowing faster communication somehow, and everyone from politicians (President Obama, for example) to Rock stars seems to be using it. Twitter allows the user to post what they're feeling at any time of the day, as much as the want during the day, but it's limited to a certain number of characters. I never knew that the internet would really want to know what was going on at every second of my life, or even if they cared, so maybe Twitter is a tool for conversation? Or if chivalry and the feeling to want to know about other people besides ourselves is emerging? Who knows. Or is it just another blogging device or a facebook-esque tool? Enlighten me.

Myth of Rules and Incentives

After listening to Barry Schwartz's TED talk about rules and incentives, it really got me thinking. Are rules and incentives really the best thing for society? Sure, I believe that a society must have some basis of law, such as regulations against murder, abuse, theft, etc., but I believe that a lot of rules and regulations can keep a person from taking ownership on the smaller things. For example, as a girl of 17, my parents have many rules for me. One is that I can only go out with friends once a weekend (bogus), and that I have to be home at a certain point. Sure, it's normal for me to be against this because I'm a teenager, but my parents have never given me a chance to try to set up my own schedule for evenings. Never once have I violated any rule of theirs or have been involved in anything a parent would call sketchy, so then why do I have rules like some sort of drug addict? I mean, I love my parents, but I think that it would be a better approach to have very little rules for outings and see how that goes. Morally, I would be taking responsibility and ownership for my actions. I would feel more obligated to abide by standard customs and the expectations of my parents because my they would be trusting me, and I would feel worse if I violated their trust when they gave me freedom. Instead, I'm pretty cynical towards these rules and feel like breaking them often.
In terms of the myth of incentives, when hearing about the people in Switzerland who felt morally obligated to dump toxic waste in their neighborhood because it was their civic duty, then about people in the same situation who were offered incentives and turned them down, I was very intrigued. It was very interesting that less people let the government dump in their area because they were offered some amount of money. I feel this same way about incentives. I feel like my incentive for all of the teenage pressures (grades, college, etc) should be me feeling good about my work, and about me taking responsibility for my own actions. I would much rather have an accomplishment, or a failure, and know that it was up to me to make it happen. Instead, I have incentives to do well because I'll "get into the college of my choice" or I'll "have more time to spend with friends." I really hate it when people breathe down my neck about these things because I think incentives, especially when used on me, are useless. Will someone please let me live with my achievements and failures, and the consequence be on me and not the tangible things around me?