Perhaps so your decedents could look at what you tweeted.

That is just sad. Have we become so narcissistic that every little inane thing that falls from our brains should be archived? I can imagine nothing more mind numbing than reading tweets. Who in their right mind is going to utilize this trove? I suppose someone wishing to further the intellectual evolution of mankind could research and write a book about how many people said "I just ate 'fill in the blank' yum!"

"All your tweets are belong to us"

^^ LOL @ 'decedents'

"I'll give you my tweets when you pry them from my cold dead hands" (slant on NRA slogan)

Trove yes, what a study that could be.

@Iamschist --> I just ate some fruitcake, and it was pretty good actually!

Library of Congress it in the process of archiving 170 billion tweets from twitter users who made public tweets according to an article on CNET.com.

That has to be the most boring job ever.

I'm personally thrilled to hear this. I didn't take twitter as anything more serious than a place for people to really annoy each other with mundane garbage 90% of the time until early last year. The I discovered twitter is the new form of data feed and mini or quasi-official press release system preferred by everyone from local schools to weather services to the USGS and all levels of govt. Everyone seems to have a twitter feed and there's as much truly valuable and useful stuff as anything. (It's also a real easy and handy way to have openly usable data feeds of real interesting stuff on a website)

Twitter seems to be the new RSS or it's equivalent in many sectors, anyway. Who cares about the goober twittering about a good ham sandwich for lunch. lol... I want the other 75% of the traffic these days. What a fascinating archive that will make to look at for people generations into the future. Nothing before this has ever existed to snapshot a whole time period this way. S/F!

Back in the days before recordings, music was played live. Or on a music box, etc. But it was never a verbatim copy.

When records first came around, a lot of people were of the opinion that Music is meant to be played live, this recording shenanigans will never take off, and if anything it will simply bring mundane and banal music to the masses. It will never be as glorious as live concerts.

And boy don't we pay a pretty penny for any recording from that era.

I know it won't be the same in 200 years when someone goes "Coh, look at this Bruce, a genuine tweet, still with the url attached."

But at least someone is thinking. as Wrabbit says, this is a new era. We're making footsteps and while we think the boots are big and we're capable of wearing them, they are but starters on this very long journey.

I think I may possibly be the only person my age without a Twitter account. Every female I know posts "Instagram" pictures of their pointless accessories and cups of coffee and blah bla bla bla
If Twitter was more like ATS, or had an ATS community I may consider but until then, i personally have never encountered a useful or knowledgeable "Tweet"