June 17 2009, 11:00am
Tweet. Tweet. Tweet. The sound of birds chirping or the sound of people talking? These days, no matter what I’m watching or reading, Twitter seems to be a major topic. But what exactly is twitter? Twitter is similar to a lot of things, but unlike anything. It is like blogging, but there is a 140 character limit. It is like the Facebook status, but is not limited to just friends. It is like instant messaging, but all your followers can read it. Simply put, it is a universal status message answering the question “What are you doing?” Twitter has a strange name and a stranger vernacular surrounding it. People use words and phrases like: “twitterati,” “tweple,” or “I just tweeted.” Before I decided to try Twitter, I was warned that initially it would seem completely stupid, and as a newbie, it did seem stupid. I did not and could not see the point of the hype of it; however, now, it is my most used social network. I first realized the power of Twitter and the power of an online community when a US Airways plane landed in the Hudson River. Instantaneously, this message was tweeted with a photo of the plane in the Hudson. It was then forwarded (or in Twitter terms, “retweeted”) throughout the twittersphere before traditional media outlets even heard about the event. Nielsen Online reported that at the end of 2008, social networking surpassed the popularity of email. For those of you still trying to communicate with listserves , there is still time. If you want to effectively communicate with an audience then go to the audience. Twitter’s capabilities are infinite! I have a constant twitter search for OrgSync, so I always know what people are saying about us. Comcast and Dell, creatively use Twitter for customer service request. At conferences, speakers take questions through Twitter and participants are then able to engage in discussion during the session. Twitter enables you to send notifications, updates, and reminders out instantly. What are other ways you are using Twitter on your campus? If you have specific questions please leave a comment and we would love to address them. It will help guide us in future posts.
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