How would you describe Twitter?
Yesterday, Vince Bank, who subscribes to Guy Kawasaki’s tweets on Twitter, complained that Guy was “over-promoting his Truemors site” which prompted Dr. Mani, a friend whose blogs I really enjoy (and learn a lot from), to ask this question, “What is Twitter to You?”
I’ve written about Twitter before on here. It’s a rather interesting site where you can send messages out to everyone who subscribes to you. The catch is, the messages can only be 140 characters long.
One of my favorite things about twitter is how easy it is to send the messages. If you’re out and about, you can set it up on your cell phone (if yours isn’t lost by your 4 year old, like mine is at the moment). If you’re on your computer, you can set it up on an IM (internet messenger). I set it up on G-Talk, which is my favorite messaging program. All I have to do to send a tweet is to type it into gtalk, just like I’m sending a message to a friend. Voila, the message gets sent out to anyone who’s following me.
A couple weeks ago, I read Caroline Middlebrook’s Big Juicy Twitter Guide. Some of it, like how to mark your favorite tweets, I found really interesting, especially since I’ve only recently started using Twitter. Other parts, such as what constitutes noise and what information is good to send, I suspect we’d disagree about. Which gets me back to Guy’s tweets.
Guy Kawasaki uses Twitter to talk about everything from the best Truemors posting yet to what kind of underwear he wears in addition to linking to interesting Truemors posts. I’ve found that I really enjoy the combination of “noise” (personal) and “business” posts, it leaves me with the sense that I’m hearing from someone real instead of just a news machine. I do want to know where he gets his Truemors links though, since often I hear them from Guy before even the news channels broadcast them.
Now I’ll admit, I probably use Twitter differently than a lot of people. I’m just learning about professional blogging, so although I’m interested in problogging, I’m not looking just for business information. Instead I use Twitter in much the same way I use Digg and a few other sites, as a service that will give me interesting, current information that I can share with other stumblers. With companies such as PBS and CNN posting up to the minute news on Twitter, it’s an easy way to stay on top of anything new.
So what is Twitter to me? My first instinct is to answer that it’s a resource, but I think that’s too broad of an answer. I loved this description of twitter from Dr. Mani’s site. It was one of the first things I ever read by him, and probably one of the reasons I started following him on Twitter. For myself, I think it reminds me a bit of a ham radio. You never know what you’re going to hear over it, but know that in the end, you’re going to learn some things and make some new friends, and all in all, that’s what’s important, isn’t it?
