Entertainment For Lively Minds
Not sure about Twitter? This is worth a look.
Posted by Handsome.P.Wonderful on 20 August 2009 - 9:43am.
Graham Linehan (Father Ted and The IT Crowd writer) is something of a star in the Twittersphere (he kicked off the #welovethenhs campaign in response to the US criticism). One of his pet gripes is the media knocking Twitter and how it's used, when they don't really understand it. He's just posted this on his blog http://glinner.posterous.com/the-conversation-23 . It's worth a look.
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I agree with most of that
Newsnight did a piece on Twitter recently, with Kirsty Wark interviewing its founder Evan Williams. It was utterly, toe-curlingly embarrassing. Williams isn't the best interviewee, but the programme would never allow her to be so ill-prepared interviewing Hamid Karzi or Rahm Emanuel, so why allow it when the story is technology related? She hadn't been able to get past the "I'm having a sandwich" perception Linehan mentions. Even when she bought up the use of Twitter in Iran recently, it was absolutely clear that she had no idea how the service actually worked, and why it had worked in that situation.
He's also right when he asks "why has no-one made Twitter easier to understand for new users yet?" Therein lies the biggest problem as far as most people who don't "get it".
I always find anyone who has national newspaper
column get snitty about normal people using twitter or facebook to discuss day to day banalites immensely ironic. They can "never see why people want to do it" and then we get hear from them about the cost of parking in chippenham.
However if anyone does want to use twitter I found using tweetdeck makes in much more easy to use, not sure if there any alternatives out there that other people use?
Software
I use Destroy Twitter, which is very similar to Tweetdeck. I don't think the use of multiple panes make either tool ideal for the person starting out, though. Twhirl is the one I'd suggest for the starter, simply because it's the one most similar to the regular IM clients people might be used to.
oh and i use
tweet69 app on my phone which works well
Do you have a Twitter ID you'd be prepare to share Chris?
@HPWonderful
go on then
@Gargarin :)
I don't tweet myself
But Dr Samuel Johnson's tweets make me laugh like a drain and this:-
http://whythatsdelightful.wordpress.com/2009/05/29/its-long-past-times-b...
by Peter Serafinowicz (from Graham Linehan's site)is fantastic.
A fascinating piece
Which makes many valid and interesting points, not least regarding the limitations of journalists.
I still think Twitter's a waste of time, though. And I still give it a year at most.
I think that something like
twitter will be a feature of internet from now on the ability to search in real time and tag information based on real people is very powerful. Even if twitter can't make money out it the process will be come part of how we use the web.
Also in a funny way you've already used it one step removed because many of the posts here stem from "tip offs" from the twitter!
I couldn't agree more
People are cancelling accounts left, right and centre.
It's a fad, pure and simple.
Glinner's article
sums up many of the key flaws with media coverage with Twitter. Many simply dismiss it as a glorified Facebook Status update when in fact it has far more in common with a blog site like this or Boing Boing.
It's not surpring, though
Because that's what it appears to be to the new user. It's only when everything "clicks" that the possibilities become apparent. I certainly didn't get it straight away.