I'm all a Twitter!

[68-eldo]

Re: Twitter?

I think I’m catching on to the vocabulary of this technology.

Twitter as a noun is the network that the messages are sent on.

Twitter as a verb is the act of sending messages by Twitter.

A Tweet is a message sent by Twitter.

A person that sends messages by Twitter is a Twit.

OK so I made the last one up, but hay it might just catch on, not long ago calling some one a geek was an insult. Now people are proud to call themselves geeks. Just kidding folks.

[mel]

Re: Twitter?

I use Twitter to notify my subscribers when my blogs are updated, when I post a new video or photograph, what song(s) I am listening to, an interesting link, a news tip, what I'm listening to on the radio or my iPod... many other things. I sometime send a tweet out to a specific subscriber.

[LocalMotion]

Re: Twitter?

Being a photographer twitter has many useful features for me.

I can share tips and information (along with gaining very valuable tips/info from others), and network with others, ultimately by posting tweets someone might want to read, it becomes another free way of publicity. if someone reads one of my tweets and likes it they might go to my page where they will see what I do, little bio, and a link to my website. I get lots of hits on my website from my twitter account.

The power is in knowing how to use twitter. Just posting only things like 'stuck in traffic' is really useless for twitter, but if you keep it fresh, exciting and enticing it's a good business tool.

you can do searches on twitter for whatever you feel like, as a business you could run a search for keywords about things your business does. from the results you could reply to someone about it, maybe answer a question for them or something, then they in turn might checkout your profile or follow you (which would lead to them probably hitting your website).

This is just one of the many uses of twitter. I didn't understand it much either about a year ago, but it's been great for me once i took the time to find out how twitter could benefit me.

[helen]

Re: Twitter?

Doing text messaging on a cell phone is one way of using Twitter. Another way of sending and receiving Twitter messages is by the web site. Of course there is an issue of how you access that web site, do you use your 2 pound netbook, your iPhone or a standard desktop computer (not that one would lug around a 18 pound mini-tower PC with a 30 pound CRT monitor).

[tutusue]

Re: Twitter?

Aha! Thanks for putting it in perspective for me, Helen. I haven't taken the time to learn how to text...yet! In spite of that, and like matapule, I just don't get the purpose of Twitter other than disseminating important information quickly. I don't get the purpose of learning, via 140 character status updates, that someone is stopped at a red light...or someone just farted...or someone just put on deodorant!

I feel the same way about Facebook, altho' I'm subscribed. I'm there because of it's ability to reunite long lost friends and family. I'm on a roll in that regard!!!

I see PZ's tweets on FB and, afaic, he puts Twitter to great use, warning of traffic jams, available jobs, charitable happenings and..."Today's office breakfast: bananas and M&Ms...". Hey, if it involves chocolate, it's important!

Huh oh, matapule...maybe we're caught in a generation gap?!

[helen]

Re: Twitter?

It depends on the kind of personal electronics you are carrying on you and what you are comfortable with. For instance if you have problems using text messaging on a cell phone then Twitter is not for you.

[matapule]

Twitter?

I don't get it. What is the big deal about Twitter? Isn't it the same thing as email? Am I missing out on something important by not signing up?

[Mike_Lowery]

Re: I'm all a Twitter!

http://www.twitter.com/mistermiranda

[scrivener]

Re: I'm all a Twitter!

In addition to Twitter Temp here at HT...

No, no. The happy, cool Twitterers are doing it here.

[pzarquon]

Re: I'm all a Twitter!

Twitter is still having a lot of outages as their service buckles under the strain of millions of users. They've started to be a little more communicative in explaining their troubles, although user frustration is also reaching a crescendo. I don't know if anyone else could build the same service from scratch, but it's clear people are clamoring for alternatives.

There was the aforementioned Jaiku and Pownce. More recently, Brightkite popped up, kind of a location-aware Twitter, and because its use spread via Twitter, a lot of the same friends are keeping up there.

Just today, though, I got turned onto Plurk, which takes the basic Twitter "microblogging" idea and remixes it quite ambitiously into a mixed timeline. The UI is quirky and takes a lot of getting used to, but some aspects -- like the fast-updating AJAX interface and threaded comments -- definitely offer a different way to track multiple conversations. That could be a bad thing, though, as I'm starting to lose myself in trying to keep up with various threads.

In any case, as I type this, Twitter is down for another three hours. In addition to Twitter Temp here at HT, you might want to give Plurk a try. Click here for an invitation that'll connect you with me automatically... for better or worse!

[Leo Lakio]

Re: I'm all a Twitter!

A-hem. (Just teasing.)

[DaFerret]

Re: I'm all a Twitter!

Ever since Dodgeball came out, I've been dying for Hawaii support. But it hasn't come. I think there's some potential there for Twitter to take up that torch.

I haven't checked out any of the other sites. While I think all these social apps are nifty, I don't think I can keep up with them all.

Anyone with the iPhone and on AT&T (I guess this could also be addressed to anyone with a default text msg plan that can upgrade to unlimited), did you spring for the unlimited text messaging? 200/month seems so little and has made me stop using it for stuff, which ends up leaving me out of the loop on many things.

Edited: Wow, I type slow. Whrrl sounds like another Dodgeball... including the limited service areas! :P

[pzarquon]

Re: I'm all a Twitter!

Signed up for Whrrl for the hell of it, though Honolulu isn't one of its metro areas just yet. (I'm in San Francisco. Whee!) I think mobile devices and localization (using SMS to find friends, review businesses, etc.) is definitely among the "next big things" out there.

Lots of companies are venturing into the space, including Google (which bought, then seems to have abandoned, Dodgeball). There's Loopt (which has an in with Sprint). I like Plazes (which seems to work best in Europe and with Nokia devices, but I'm all over it in Hawaii via iPhone!). There's Imity (which is focused on Bluetooth). There's Socialight (which I've just signed up to try). There's Rummble (which I've never seen before). And Mobiluck and MeetMoi and...

But all of these sites try to do so much. And I think Twitter's success comes from what little it does. Just 140 characters to do whatever you like. Send shout-out to friends, ask questions, express random thoughts, or, yes, to answer the question, "What are you doing?"

[Leo Lakio]

Re: I'm all a Twitter!

Putting this in the right place:

The next step?

(Not yet available in Hawai`i, but perhaps worth keeping an eye on. Just heard an interview on the radio, in a one-hour program on "The Future of Cell Phones.")

[pzarquon]

Re: I'm all a Twitter!

I wasn't even thinking about Pownce, though it is having a party tonight as it comes out of private beta. It just hasn't sucked me in, even though it has some features Twitter doesn't (including 'payloads' like photos and audio files). I think Jaiku is great, but without an active user base, it's useless.

The thing is, "status updates" are everywhere. Facebook and Myspace for starters, and they have the advantage of a built-in user base. Even Plazes, which is hard to categorize, added "what are you doing" to "where are you" a while back. Which makes me wonder, maybe Twitter succeeds only because it's only Twitter, and because it was the first. Perhaps by the time Twitter has a serious competitor, everyone will have moved on to the next best thing?

There's a lot of room for Twitter to go, though, I'd say focused around its SMS integration and perhaps localization options. (Imagine Tweeting questions to a specific Twitter alias to get answers, directions, etc.) And Dave Winer is pushing them toward "payloads," so it can become (among other things) a RSS podcast channel.