Metropol

Oh crap, I'm getting this uneasy feeling of paranoia I got a couple of years ago when it seemed that I can't go 5 bloody minutes without hearing about Facebook and that I was a social luddite for not being on it. I now feel compelled to get a twitter account despite nothing interesting happening in my life (at the moment). It'd be like blogging to brick wall.

Interesting article from the Grauniad about Twitter pollution. A similar problem that occured when blogs started.

http://tinyurl.com/bcdrst

I'm the only person in my Hotmail contacts that actually has an account so I can't see myself using it at all. To me it looks like Facebook, but not quite as good.

Although I did hate Facebook when it first started...

I am kind of Twittering to myself at the moment, or at least I was until some guy I haven't seen since high school added me after obviously doing a Hotmail search. The main reason I signed up and posted some dross in May was to get an account before Twitter took off - which I think it is about to - and therefore demonstrate what a cool cat I am. And it's taken that amount of time for me to get interested - but I am slowly getting into it.

I can't work out why. I remember doing a similar sort of thing with Facebook. Back in the day when you had to be "invited" to join once your uni or workplace had its own network I signed up when I could, but I just didn't get it. It was no Myspace. It took a good six months for anyone I knew to appear. And as soon as they did, the rest was history. At least with Facebook I can understand its use and enjoyment. On paper, Twitter is rubbish. But I think there's something interesting about recording text message-sized snapshots of your life and thoughts, and this idea is now moving from mainly business users to the public at large, perhaps courtesy of some marketing from Jonathan Ross and Stephen Fry.

Hmmm...
I've just taken the plunge following Stephen Fry's rave review. Not sure whether I'll use it or not though, like Ant I'm the only person in my Hotmail contacts to have signed up so I'll see how it goes.

http://twitter.com/TonyLeMesmer

Very much with you DAS. I remember when I first heard about Facebook, and it was pretty much just US instituions that were on it. I was much more a MySpace person, slagged off Facebook. Just another social networking tool. But three years down the line, here we are.

I'm slowly getting into Twitter. It does not have as many functions as Facebook - but I quite like that. It's purpose is for mini blogging, updates on our musings and thoughts, and being able to see quickly at a glance at feed see what others are up to.

They are two different mediums, and I do believe that this time next year, most of us will be "tweeting".

rts wrote:They are two different mediums, and I do believe that this time next year, most of us will be "tweeting".

Y'all don't want to know what I'm thinking most of the time.

Trust me on that.

I doubt I'll be tweeting.

Eek, I started looking at my very first tweets from early 2007, where I seemed to be taking the 'What are you doing?' idea to its logical conclusion, with thrilling updates like:

"Need a shower" - 10:34
"Going for a shower" - 10:55
"Just out of shower" - 11:17

As for the Facebook comparisons - other than the status update idea they're just not competing - I wouldn't call Twitter a social network, just as much as I wouldn't call 'blogging' one. It's merely a platform that lets people contort it how they want. You'll have the "9:15pm - Just had a wank" types, those covering the news, and those trying to cajole their audience into conversation.

Reminder tools on Twitter:
http://twitter.com/timer
http://twitter.com/rtm
http://twitter.com/nozbe

Calendar:
http://twitter.com/gcal

Time delayed responses:
http://twitresponse.com/

Twitter tips:
http://www.twitip.com/

I don't like lots of clutter when browsing, but this looks handy:

http://www.friendbar.com/

rts wrote:I don't like lots of clutter when browsing, but this looks handy:

http://www.friendbar.com/

I notice that fits into less than 140 characters. If only there was a dedicated place you could post such crumbs and people could choose whether to follow them