I recently signed onto Twitter as part of an experiment called the ‘Black Ink Project’ and my first impression wasn’t good. It seems like such a trivial pursuit, telling people that you’re ‘brushing your teeth now’, or ‘going to bed, good night!’ and if you use it for that it most definitely IS for the birds…or you have way too much time on your hands!
However (you knew that was coming, didn’t you?) I have spent the last 2 days ‘twittering’ getting the hang of it, and using it in a way that I’ve never used a social network before. Being a homeschool mom with over a dozen blogs and websites (all in need of something!) 5 grandchildren that live locally, a son getting married in 2 months and a disabled husband, I definitely don’t have time for chit-chat. I do have a Facebook account, but mostly just to stay connected with another son that is in college, and I’ve never really gotten the hang of it.
The two days on Twitter has shown me a new dimension of online networking that I have read about but never really embraced. Your comments on Twitter are limited to 140 characters which is extremely challenging to someone like me, but I’m getting the hang of it quickly. It’s fun to watch and read what goes on, sort of like watching a merri-go-round, only on fast speed. Of course, it depends on the kind of people you are watching (following), but I’ve gotten a glimpse of a different world, and learned many new (business-related) things!
The jury is still out on this new twitter-thing, anyone else have experience on it? Even tho I’ve enjoyed what I’ve learned and experienced so far, doesn’t mean it’ll be a long term thing for me and time will tell if it’s worth the extra time over the long haul.
My twitter ID is homeschoolbiz – check it out, maybe we should start a homeschool network on there?
Be sure to say ‘hi!’
Well the ease of use (not counting the down time), the desktop tools and API’s, make the process much less burdensome as you would imagine.
Now, throw on top of that tools like Jott, and you have an interesting environment to play in.
http://roihunters.wordpress.com/2008/05/30/jott-thought-hosting/