Well, maybe not, but according to this article in the SJ Merc, it got a UC Berkeley grad student out of an Egyptian jail.
Buck, 29, a former Oakland Tribune multimedia intern, used the ubiquitous short messaging service to tap out a single word on his cellular phone: ARRESTED. The message went out to the cell phones and computers of a wide circle of friends in the United States and to the mostly leftist, anti-government bloggers in Egypt who are the subject of his graduate journalism project.
The next day, he walked out a free man with an Egyptian attorney hired by UC Berkeley at his side and the U.S. Embassy on the phone.
There is always a huge urge to make technology, especially new technology, the center of things. It will change the world, it will revolutionize the way we build cities, it will make us smarter, etc. Lost in the hype is the fact that often the most profound impacts of technology are the ones that play out over time, not the ones we see right away.
Twitter is a cool service. But it didn't get Buck out of jail. Four years ago, the story would've been that his blog got him out of jail. 10 years before that it would've been his cell phone that got him out of jail. 10 years before that it would've been a chain letter of protest sent to the government.
What especially grates in this story is the sense of hubris that comes through -- the sense that the technology used was more important than what happened itself. It's a valley view of the world, for sure. Technology can be a powerful communications tool, but what is said is more important than the tool.
Just food for thought.