Friday March 29th, 2024
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The Twitter Effect

Associated Press' official Twitter account was hacked, causing the Dow Jones to drop 50 points in just a few minutes...

Staff Writer

It seems that, in this word of internet connectivity, the flapping of a butterfly's wings is no longer required to cause a hurricane - all you need now is a Twitter account with millions of followers.

Last night, the official Associated Press Twitter account was hacked, and sent out a tweet claiming that two explosions had hit the White House and that Obama was injured. After the false news was retweeted thousands of times, the Dow Jones (the US' main stock index) dropped from 130 to 80 points.

Now, this tell us two things.

1) The world is a scarily small place.

2) Stock brokers are now using Twitter as a source. No one tweet that Egypt is going bankrupt; it just might happen.