Twitter often gets a bad rap. Who cares what I ate for dinner, described in 140 characters or less?

As a writer, I find Twitter to be a wonderful resource for information. Many advocacy groups use Twitter to highlight their work. I can log into my account and before me lays a list of stories to explore.
Here are a few of my favorite democracy-themed Twitter feeds. Feel free to share yours as well.

http://twitter.com/takingitglobal
Taking IT Global uses social media tools to empower young people.

http://twitter.com/DemocracyIntl
Provides an inside look at election monitoring in Afghanistan.

http://twitter.com/DigiActive
A group of so-called “digital activists.”

http://twitter.com/tweetcongress
Tracks members of U.S. Congress using Twitter.

http://twitter.com/IRIglobal
The International Republican Institute also has a lot of experience with election monitoring.

http://twitter.com/DowningStreet and http://twitter.com/WhiteHouse
For those interested in government twitterers, here are twitter feeds from the Prime Minister of England and the White House.

Oh, and by the way, you can follow me on Twitter too. http://twitter.com/MAusteinBrooks

The recent Red Line accident on the Washington subway system, the Metro, has me thinking about how I get news these days. Even though I was in the Metro system at the time of the crash and heard announcements about a train with “mechanical difficulties,” I did not realize anything serious had happened until I got home and turned on my computer. There I saw messages from friends on Facebook expressing relief that they had not been in the accident and asking about the status of others who use the subway.

I quickly logged on Twitter, where I found tweets (140-character text messages) from the Washington Post containing links to stories, blogs and photos on its Web site, as well as a video feed from local broadcast station Channel 8. The Washington Post also used Twitter as a means of gathering information, asking anyone who had been in or knew someone in the crash to contact the newspaper and/or send photos. I also received tweets from news organizations outside the Washington area, such as the New York Times, the Los Angeles Times and the Miami Herald, as well as messages from individual journalists. I found it exciting to access all this news “in real time.”

About an hour after I got on the computer, my husband arrived home and turned on the television to watch the news of the accident. I joined him, but also continued monitoring my machine. I found it amusing that I often would receive an update via Twitter just as the broadcaster would provide the same information. The next morning, I again logged on to my Twitter and Facebook accounts to get updates on the situation, then listened to the radio during my short drive to the subway.

As Michael and Tanya have asked, should this reliance on sources other than print media cause worry? At no time did I depend on a physical newspaper for news, but I did monitor many different news channels for information. Are all these types of media killing off news organizations, or are they a sign of their adaptation?

While the post-election situation in Iran is still making news all over the world, it was the build-up to the Iranian elections that first caught my attention.  I couldn’t help but notice that some of the details coming out about the issues and the voters seemed very familiar.

I listened as Iranians interviewed by U.S. radio stations said they were looking for change.  Some said they felt their country’s reputation had been damaged and that world opinion had turned against them.  They wanted this trend to stop.  There was talk across numerous media outlets of the importance of the youth vote, as well as talk of the critical role of women on election day. 

Aren’t these some of the same things I heard during elections in my own country?  During the U.S. elections, a lot of Americans were also calling for change.  Many felt that their country’s reputation in the world had also been damaged.  Just as Iranian youth were getting attention as a powerful voting bloc, American youth proved to be a strong organizing and voting force for then-candidate Obama.  And just as the media speculated on the importance of female voters in Iran, so too did it speculate on the importance of female voters in the U.S.

What’s more, social media – most notably blogs and Twitter - are playing an important role in the Iranian election aftermath, much as they were a critical organizing tool for the Obama and McCain campaigns.  We’ve even seen the important role social media played in the recent Indian elections as well. 

Am I the only one who noticed these similarities between the elections of these two countries?  Some of the same issues, the same speculations, the same commentaries, the same public sentiment and the same voting blocs existed for both.

With national elections in the world’s most populous democracy, India, coming to an end earlier than had been predicted, the blogosphere is buzzing with analysis of the results.

Gaurav Mishra at Global Voices lists election reactions and observations that Indian voters posted on Twitter.

Kanishk Tharoor at OpenIndia talks about how the Indian media failed to correctly predict the election results.

Dr. Karan Thakur at India Times draws parallels between the 2009 Indian elections and the 2008 American elections.

At indianelections.blogadda.com you can see how social media tools such as YouTube and Flickr were used to discuss and document the 2009 Indian Elections.

What are your thoughts on the 2009 Indian elections?