Speed and networking torpedo traditional journalistic values

Were the state parliamentary elections in Germany improperly influenced? A good 90 minutes before polling stations closed the first prognoses on the parliamentary elections were on the Net in the microblog Twitter. For the left-liberal daily Frankfurter Rundschau there is no way of keeping exit poll data under lock and key: "All it takes is a single busybody and the news is all over the world. Speed and networking, the major strengths of a service like Twitter, here torpedo traditional journalistic values. Not even a possible fine of up to 50,000 euros for deliberately violating election secrecy acts as a deterrent. That's why any attempt to enforce stricter controls on the use of exit polls by legal means will no doubt also prove ineffective. 'Information wants to be free' said the author Stewart Brand at a hacker conference in 1984. That is true enough. But it doesn't stop us from making responsible use of the information at our disposal. In all freedom, of course."

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