Can you copyright a tweet?

This panel was expertly guided by Fred Benenson and Wendy Selzer. Despite some reading in the past, I'm admittedly not too clear on what Creative Commons Licensing actually is or does, and since it came up a lot I didn't completely follow the conversation.

I had two takeaways, the first was some bits of copyright law, quoted to us. To be copyrighted, it has to occur in a "tangible medium of expression," and courts have ruled that computer RAM counts. Also, it has to be an "original work of authorship" (not facts) and not "expressions so minimal..." ergo many tweets are not eligible for copyright.

However, one mamma is most certainly eligible. Momku was one of the last audience commenters. Her tweets would definitely meet the above criteria. Nonetheless, she said that she does not think her tweets are protected, "however if I get a book deal i might go back on that." Along those lines, Ms. Selzer made a great point at the end, stating that the online community does a better (certainly faster) job of policing itself than any team of lawyers and judges has. "Something other than the law," Selzer said, "is working better than the law. We're doing pretty well with our norms."