Twitter’s early ethos was reciprocity and attribution, not broadcast.

Evidence

In these tweets, @replies are used to notify others that the people referenced are geographically proximate. In the tech scene, Twitter was presumed to be reciprocal, a true technology of the networked audience rather than a broadcast mechanism. As a result, it was considered proper to include someone in an @reply if they were in attendance at an event, or were part of an ongoing conversation. Re-tweets were attribution, so rebroadcasting someone’s tweet without crediting them was akin to plagiarism. People who continually tweeted without acknowledging anyone else, responding to @replies, or re-tweeting their friends were derided. Interaction designer Adrian Chan called these frequent references to others a way to delineate a tribe, a form of “social inclusion.” — Alice E. Marwick, Status Update, 228

Categorization

• XREF: Connects to reader’s understanding of how platform norms shift from reciprocal to broadcast; relevant to creator culture’s attention economy. — connects to: Early Twitter norms pressured public accounts because privacy defeated self-promotion. — Alice E. Marwick, Status Update: Celebrity, Publicity,…, 234
• SHARE: The etiquette rule that retweeting without credit was ‘akin to plagiarism’ in early Twitter is a great detail for someone studying platform history.

Broader Connections

• Early Twitter norms pressured public accounts because privacy defeated self-promotion. #corroborates (0.85) — Alice E. Marwick, Status Update, 234