I’ve been using and reading about Twitter a great deal lately. My initial reaction to it was, “What’s the point?” To use a word I often use, it seemed slight. A kind of technological candy floss. However, I’m finding now my use of it increasing as well as finding it’s usefulness increasing.
A lot of this is due to an app that allowed me to add a lot of New Brunswick users with a technology focus, all at once. I’m in New Brunswick so I’ve been looking for ways to connect and follow people in the technology, business and marketing areas. Prior to adding the app, I primarily had friends who were located mostly in western Canada.
And what’s the value in following a whole bunch of people on Twitter? As mentioned, to have a connection of some sort with people of similar interests who were located relatively near me. In other words, locating a community I could interact with in some way. But that’s not all. Connection is nice, but is there more?
The answer is yes because in all the tweets I’m being directed to articles, blog posts and so on that I would otherwise have missed because I was unaware of them or, in the case of David Winer’s blog, I had forgotten was there. To put it more exactly, the current of tweets is like an endlessly flowing stream of ideas. It’s impossible to keep up with them all and there is the hazard of distraction to be cautious about but, for me, this is the biggest value of all things Internet related. Ideas.
Mind you, I often don’t quite grasp them or will misconstrue them, but that’s how it goes.
By the way … the thing about Winer’s Fractional Horsepower Twitters? has to do with his understanding of Twitter and mine. I’d like to get a better sense for what he means when he refers to it. For him, I think, there is a technical aspect to the word’s meaning whereas for me (a non-tech person with an interest in technology) it’s a limited meaning related to function (how people use it). So I don’t quite grasp what he’s suggesting when he asks a question like, “What if everyone could have their own Twitter?” If Twitter exists already, what would be the point of having a seperate one for each individual? Or is this a misreading of what he’s suggesting?
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