A recent xkcd is riffing on the subject of a study correlating sms messaging with higher scores in grammar and spelling tests.
To me, this smells bad. I agree that constant reading and writing should make using the written word an easier task, but I think a constant stream of such is not likely to confer any real talent or understanding. In the same way that a constant diet of cotton candy doesn't make you predisposed to being a chef, sucking from the twitter firehose isn't going to make you a black belt* in English class.
Ugh. Here's where I make new enemies. xkcd is conflating constant status updates and tweeting with Writing as a Skill. Which isn't really the same thing at all. You get better at stuff by actively practicing and having smarter people tell you where and why you suck. I can write a thousand blog posts and still be a shitty writer (I am not. I am also arrogant.) but if you don't also spend that time evaluating what you have done and work on making improvements, then you continue to suck.
In short, it's not a bunch of kids playing catch, it's a bunch of jackasses throwing bottles at a building. There's no real feedback, so there's no incentive or education beyond a single kid wanting to get better. No one really gives a shit about corrections in youtube comments or your twitter feed. Unless someone has the motivation, the best they're going to do is ape the conventions of the medium they're using. Those kids aren't learning to write, they're learning a shitty version of boilerplate.
*full disclosure. I never got my black belt, I dropped out of my martial arts schools, and stopped going to college. I have now taught most of the things I went there to learn.
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