Maybe news websites can stop embedding tweets now

I get it. For the past ten to fifteen years, people working in newsrooms have been embedding tweets into articles. Whether it was part of a live blog, as a quote to enrich an article, or as a way to embed a video or cite a source, tweets have been part of the digital landscape and of what makes an article.

Also, at one point (not sure if this is still the case), Twitter was the place where things happened, where politicians spoke, where commentators expressed themselves, where breaking news appeared first. Hashtags, trending topics, viral tweets, spicy replies… we all know the drill. Twitter was the de facto newswire of the internet, a substitute for PR, and, because of that, somehow a news story without any tweet embedded in it felt empty, incomplete, just like it would be if there were no banner image, no date, or no title.

Quotes, jokes, even pictures and videos started to appear in articles as embedded tweets, right along the social media icons which were encouraging readers to share a link. Sometimes it added value to the content. Sometimes embedded tweets were used — I suppose — to make it easier with the rights and permissions of some of the materials: if it’s already public on Twitter, it can surely be part of the article without having to ask permissions.

I found that sports coverage is where this was/is the most obvious. Need to show the goal scored by the team you’re covering? Well, find the tweet and embed it: free, easy, fast. Finding the YouTube video, if it is even available, can require a bit more work from the editor, as it may not be the right width, there could be ads and/or potentially unwelcome suggested videos displayed at the end: not ideal. A tweet felt/is more straightforward.

But if some of these use cases could be understood when Twitter was very relevant (like it was until a few years ago: you know when), today it raises other important questions, as Twitter, even if less relevant than before, still has some kind of weight.

I won’t go into detail as to why I think Twitter should be avoided and why media companies should stop giving it so much visibility and letting it gain so much authority. The company’s owner’s toxic attitude and far-right agenda alone justify this, as far as I’m concerned. Are any media companies embedding Truth Social posts or Rumble videos? Why not? I truly believe that the same reasoning should now also apply to tweets. Another reason, as pointed out by Techdirt, is that the platform may not last as long as the articles.

Where most of the media websites have become lazy is not only in the apparent refusal of their journalists to let go of Twitter as users, but also in the fact that they don’t even question their habit of “embedding tweets” into articles. Sometimes it makes sense, sure. But sometimes, it feels like this is done automatically, to a point of ridiculousness: not to accompany the content, but as a substitute for it.

Many local media outlets and sports media embed tweets for any reason, be it a weather report, user-generated content, a politician’s quote, or a data fact from Opta, among others. They only use tweets and almost never incorporate posts from Instagram, TikTok, or LinkedIn. Quotes from famous politicians surely exist on several platforms: why give Twitter the monopoly of social media quotes?

Also, tweets don’t appear in my browser (not sure if it’s because of content blockers, my StopTheMadness settings, or a cookie issue), so sometimes I can’t even see the information I’m trying to read.

Thunderstorm alerts in these regions? Where is the map? Oh right, it should be in this white space because the author of the article embedded a tweet with the map instead of putting an image on the website of the freaking map that is the main topic of the article. Where does this terrible habit come from exactly? Is there a reason for it that I don’t see? For a football video, I can maybe understand, but for a jpeg of a map?

What would it take for regular media companies and their editors to stop?

What would it take for them to use Mastodon, Threads, or Bluesky posts instead of tweets? Does an alternative way to do what they gained by using embedded tweets need to gain traction? Should Twitter declare bankruptcy? Should Elon Musk become even more of a jackass? Do politicians and journalists themselves need to show the way to editors? Why blindly keep these habits alive?

For instance, back in May or so, the semi-finals of the UEFA Champions League took place. “The Bayern team and fans were not happy about an offside” yeah but what is the reality? Is there anything more to this article? The game is over. The replay is available. Was there actually an offside or not? Reading most of these articles, it’s hard to know. Articles just leave it like this, hoping people will debate in the comments sections or on social media replies to create engagement.

Most of the sports websites I look at fall into the same trap of looking for clicks and provoking engagement, not analysis and facts. It’s a shame really. If I want to have a supporter’s opinion on something — and nothing more — I’ll find it myself, and I would have kept my social media profiles active if I wanted to read that. I don’t need a journalist to embed a tweet for me to read it without adding anything to explain or clarify. How is this journalism?

But I digress.

I think tweets are embedded into most articles without publishers even thinking twice about it. That’s a big problem in itself, and one that the media industry is quite known for: refusal to evolve and adapt. Now that embedded tweets are a solid part of the way to do things, it may take a complete disappearance of the platform for them to even start questioning their use of tweets.

In the meantime, embedding tweets — and mainly tweets, as if the rest of the social media sites didn’t exist — helps Twitter artificially maintain its relevance over others, which is part of what its owner needs to further push his fetid agenda.