What is Twitter?
by Geeks on Tour: This isn’t exactly RV related, but Twitter can be used to keep up with the RVing community. So many people ask me about Twitter, it must be time for an article. I like to explain by example, so let me show you how I’m using Twitter. I just visited my Twitter home page, and this is what I saw:
I feel like I’m walking into a room where there are lots of people milling about and talking. The cool part is that these are all people I’ve chosen for one reason or another, it’s my special party room. And they aren’t too talkative, just a few words about what they’re doing or what they’re thinking. In less than a minute of glancing at my Twitter home page, I’m up-to-date with all the people I’m ‘Following.’
Let me introduce you around. The first person you see at my party represents Public Earth. These are people we met at The Rally. They are launching a special website about places. You can find and view these places using a Google Maps interface, store your places in your Public Earth account, and download them to your dashtop GPS for directions. I think it’s something I’m really going to like – and I won’t forget about it because I’m following their ‘tweets.’
Next comes GypsyJournal – this is Nick Russell, a fulltime RVer, and a friend. I usually follow his blog, but that takes a lot more time than just seeing him at my Twitter party! Because of this post, I see that he’s getting ready to go to the Escapades – and we’ll see him there.
Now you see Charlene Li – I’ve never met Charlene. She is an author and a speaker; a recognized expert in the new Social Media and what it all means. I value her opinion. She liked the new Star Trek … I’ll bet I will too.
EMasie is Elliott Masie. I know Elliott from back in the 80s when he produced the Computer Training and Support Conferences and I was a speaker there. He is a top thinker and trendsetter in the education field and I love being able to see what he’s up to in such an easy, quick, unobtrusive way. I’m sure I’ll enjoy his tweets from India.
If you want to start your own party, just go to Twitter.com and sign up for a free account. Then you can find other people who are on Twitter and click the ‘Follow’ button below their names, voila! instant party. If you also start writing some of your own tweets, you may find that some people start following you. If you have a business, this can be used for marketing. My latest tweet was about how I was looking for membership site software for my latest website … within minutes, I received an email that a membership site software business was now ‘following’ me on Twitter. That means that I’ll show up in their party room, but they’re not in mine unless I follow them.
Do you need to be on Twitter? Of course not. But, if you’re already spending time online visiting people’s blogs and otherwise browsing – you may actually find that Twitter saves you time. The RV.net blog can be followed on Twitter – see the link at the top, far right. Once you’re looking at RV.net’s Twitter page, you may want to check out who’s at their party! See who RV.net is following, and you may want to follow them too. It is so quick and easy to fill your party room with people you enjoy.
So, what’s the difference between Facebook and Twitter? Facebook is a lot more complex. I haven’t figured out Facebook yet. Twitter is nice and simple – at least so far! It allows you to write short snippets (tweets) about what you’re doing or thinking, it allows others to follow your tweets, and you to follow others.
If you’re interested in learning more about the phenomenon that Twitter is becoming, you can watch this video by the founder of Twitter, Evan Williams.
Chris Guld, www.GeeksonTour.com
Twitter: http://twitter.com/GeeksOnTour
and http://twitter.com/chrisguld
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Hi Chris – Though I should know you would probably be on Twitter, I didn’t actually know you were. I will now start following your tweets. By the way, my Twitter name is boondockbob. Bob
I’ve been on Twitter for a while, but still haven’t grasped the whole concept. I’m seeing people with common interests tweeting, but I can’t find where they all meet. I’m guessing there should be a subject chat room somewhere. I just signed up on tweetdeck to see if that makes it easier to follow people of similar interests. Thanks for the Public Earth info, I’m now a follower.
Twitter: CherylinMass
Hi Bob,
Yes, I have visited your Twitter page – I think Jim is following you, now I am too.
tweet, tweet
CherylInMass,
Well, I don’t think anyone can grasp the whole concept because it’s a moving target. I hope you watch the video that I linked to – that gives a big picture anyway – and some ideas of where it’s going. The organizational structure is just by the people though … not by interest. So, if you’re interested in a topic – find someone else who is also interested (you can use the search for that) and start following them, and follow some people that they follow. Pretty quickly, you’ve made your own interest group.
As Chris said, Twitter isn’t chat rooms like you saw with the old America onLine or some of the other IM services. Twitter is considered “Microblogging,” where you post one or two sentences for your friends to read. If you want to find people with the same or similar interests as yourself, you just use the search bar and search for a specific subject or user, like Chris himself or anyone else you know is on.
You also have the ability to find out who they are following, or who else is following them. This gives you the ability to join them by following the same people. Of course, this also means your ‘Following/Followers’ lists can get very big and unwieldy-looking, but it’s not like you have to interact with all of them. If they say something that interests you, you can reply to them, but you don’t have to unless you want to. Same goes for anyone following you; you may get a notice that you’re being followed, but that doesn’t mean you have to Follow them in turn unless you want to.
I do offer one bit of advice: if they have a huge list of followers or are themselves following a huge list (say, anything over 500 people) you might want to either ignore them or block them. Don’t follow them just because they’re following you. If they don’t look like people you’d want to follow, then simply ignore them. If they get annoying; block them. Twitter makes it easy to do that.
The New York Times has a nice article on twitter… It has some cool tips on various applications as well… happy tweeting..
Times article is at:
http://tinyurl.com/day94q
Tweet Deck is one of my fav applications for making sense of all the twitterness.
–
Dale
Twitter seems to be a waste of time. The twittering that I have seen can be defined in one word: “boring”.
Who cares what I am thinking or doing?….I’m happy with my life…simple as it is. I certainly don’t much care how someone I don’t know is feeling or what they are eating for breakfast.
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I have to agree with Gary, even though I have an internet based business with probably the largest library of researched aquarium articles spread over several web sites. I have most of the social media sites boring and extreme wastes of time, and Twitter takes the cake as to the aspect of what is wrong with Social media sites IMO.
Why should someone care what I do everyday nor my life is complete without knowing what other persons are doing, Honestly email, forums, and blogs work plenty well if I need to keep up with persons I care about.
As well, since the media (which is not all that RV friendly) is pushing Twitter down our throats (see ABC GMA), all the more reason to pray Twitter dies a quick death so that I can stop reading or hearing about it.
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