Everyday im Twittering...

Twitter...Twitter...what can I say about this social media platform?
Despite the title of this blog I don't twitter everyday, I don't even have an account!
You can imagine the predicament im in as having to write about it. Fear not for I have researched (kinda) on this topic. So lets begin the dissection.

Its a bird get it?!

Twitter is basically a social networking service that uses a form of microblogging referred to as "tweets", limited to only 140 characters they blog about practically anything from the mundane to life-crisis (which can also be mundane). A person known as Jack Dorsey created Twitter in March 2006, launching it in July effectively opening up the gateway for celebrities and a bunch of nobodies to tweet pointless drivel and experiences no-one will particularly care about it.




Sorry Jesus :(

If Jesus had twitter I would follow him, he is anything but mundane. It would be like "I fed a country with a loaf of bread, can you?". No offence to anyone religious, I just reckon he is an awesome guy. Back to topic however, there is basically a hierarchy within the twittersphere, there are the followers (basically peons, drones kind of like those worker ants) and followees (Royalty, Kingpins etc). This simple hierarchy is the foundation of the twittersphere with celebrities and interesting characters tending to trend into becoming followees and people with low self-esteem and nothing else to do in life as followers. In fact there are figures I ripped straight from the twitter wiki, as its wikipedia take it with a grain of salt!

"San Antonio-based market-research firm Pear Analytics analyzed 2,000 tweets (originating from the US and in English) over a two-week period in August 2009 from 11:00 AM to 5:00 PM (CST) and separated them into six categories:^[68]

• Pointless babble – 40%
• Conversational – 38%
• Pass-along value – 9%
• Self-promotion – 6%
• Spam – 4%
• News – 4%^[68]

Social networking researcher Danah Boyd responded to the Pear Analytics survey by arguing that what the Pear researchers labelled "pointless babble" is better characterized as "social grooming" and/or "peripheral awareness" (which she explains as persons "want[ing] to know what the people around them are thinking and doing and feeling, even when co-presence isn’t viable").^[69]"

Although this was research was conducted in 2009, its interesting to see the development of pointless babble taking the lead by 2%, followed by conversational.

While tweeting has its moments, I believe there are times when they used the twitter website as an instant news feed for crisis or disaster. In those moments I believe they are helpful to others and the community as a whole but that is an exception, otherwise I find I can spend my time in better places or mediums.

To summarise there are indeed people who are twittering everyday, I despise those types of people as in most cases people dont really care that you put your new kicks on or are having a shower with your dog. But in situations where instant messaging or retweeting urgent messages are a necessity, i believe twitter fufills this role or maybe a mass sms text wave...either way if a crisis were to occur i would no doubt be a victim as i would never check twitter and most likely would fall in hard times if victim to such a random crisis which requires twittering as the only form of notification. That is all.