Whither Twitter?An Introduction to Twitter, blogging, and RSS

Presented by Roman KoshykarLiaison Librarian to GCCIS, Wallace Library

in conjunction with the Center for Professional DevelopmentApril 28, 2009

Today’s agenda

Crash course in TwitterWhat is Twitter good for?Some examples of Twitter use at RITA little bit about blogging (Twitter’s big

brother)Explanation of RSS – the technology that

makes all this possible

What is all the chatter about?

What is ? 1. A free, web-based social networking service2. An annoying, time-wasting fad3. The fastest growing social networking site of

20094. The best-known example of a micro-blogging

system5. A great way for mobile computing users to

communicate

Twitter is all of these things!

Yes, even the “annoying fad” partLet’s look at these characteristics one by one

(in no particular order)

Twitter is a social networkThe premise of Twitter is that each and every

Twitter user is to answer the same question over and over again

WHAT ARE YOU DOING RIGHT NOW?Twitter is highly social, and every Twitter

user can follow other users’ postsTwitter is NOT instant messaging – it is not a

real-time conversation

Twitter is a micro-blogging systemMicro-blogs are just what they sound like –

short-form blogs where content is posted in very small chunks

Twitter limits you to no more than 140 characters in a single post (that includes spaces and punctuation)

Twitter has been called the Web’s equivalent of the Short Message Service (SMS) – more commonly known by cell phone users and teenagers everywhere as “texting”

Twitter is mobileMobile computing is huge – even bigger outside the

United StatesPeople with iPhones or BlackBerries can post to their

Twitter accounts and read other people’s Twitter posts using their mobile devices

Laptop/desktop Twitter users interact with Twitter’s Web site; mobile phone users can get Twitter posts via text messages; smart phone users download a special interface (called an “app”) to their device to use Twitter

The most popular mobile Twitter app is called Twitterific

Twitter is growing exponentiallyTwitter was only created in 2006The Internet demographics firm Quantcast tracks

Twitter usage – let’s look at some statsEnd of February 2009 – 6 million usersEnd of March 2009 – 15 million users (estimated)

Twitter’s user population grew 2 ½ times in one month!

Twitter has become so popular, there are many examples from this year and last year of the site crashing due to heavy use

Most famous example – Macworld 2008, when Steve Jobs gave his keynote address

Twitter is an annoying fad?Well, decide for yourself…One of the articles on handout –

the Psychology of TwitterTwitter pros: its popularity shows that it fits a

niche in the world of online communication; it’s a public conversation medium

Twitter cons: it defaults to public conversation (you have to turn on privacy features yourself); since it’s continuous and nonstop, you can easily feel like you have missed something – like walking into the middle of a conversation

What is it good for?

According to Twitter’s own site, Twitter is good for real-time updates to your friends and family

New York Times tech reporter David Pogue has a good example of Twitter’s usefulness

More from David Pogue (short video)Twitter’s been all over the news this year –

read all about it on your own!

Let’s talk TwitterTwitter users have developed their own

terminologyTwitter (n): the name of the world’s most

popular micro-blogging serviceTwitter (v): to post something on Twitter –

also has the infinitive form TwitteringTweet: a post on TwitterSomeone who posts on Twitter is a Twitterer

or a Tweeter (I’ve heard both)

Let’s talk Twitter (advanced)Hash tagging: the practice of tagging Tweets

(that is, assigning them an identifying keyword called a tag) with a hash mark (aka pound sign). Twitter users can search these hash tags on the Twitter site to find Tweets about some particular topic (#rochester or #rit, for example)

At replies: @ sign followed by a Twitter user name identifies a Tweet directed at another Twitter user – helps you have conversations with others via Tweets

Time to have a look!

Test Twitter page set up for today’s sessionhttp://twitter.com/SampleForTestI’ll log in and show you some of the basic

features

Time to have a look!

A couple of personal accounts from my co-workershttp://twitter.com/Chrislerchhttp://twitter.com/bizlibrarian

Updates on Twitter from RIT departmentshttp://twitter.com/RIT_InfoSechttp://twitter.com/RITNEWSYou’ll end up discovering others by looking at

who is following these Twitter feeds!

Try it for yourself

Beginner’s guide to Twitter (listed on your handout)

Really, Twitter is blogging?

Blogging is a much more established practice than Twittering – been around for roughly a decade; probably caught on around five years ago

The idea is the same – you set up a personal site (they provide the framework) and you write about and post what you are interested in (you provide the content)

Blogging sites often offer more features – commenting, ability to post images, embed video or sound clips

Really, Twitter is blogging?Biggest difference between Twittering and

blogging – short form (only 140 characters!) vs. long form

Twitter users have come up with creative ways of getting around the character limit

Use of link shortening sites like TinyURL – allows you to take a very long link and shorten it, so as to use many fewer characters

“Serial Tweets” – post things in chunks – there’s no limit to the number of Tweets, only to the length of each Tweet

Some popular blogging sites

Blogger – Google’s popular blogging siteLiveJournal – oldest blogging site, structured

like an online diaryWordPress – another popular blogging siteMovable Type – rather than a Web site,

Movable Type is software you install – example is Business Resources Blog from the Library

How do they work?The technology that powers Twitter,

blogging, and other social web sites is called Really Simple Syndication (RSS)

RSS is a technology used to create “feeds” on the Web; these feeds allow for continuous publication of news, blog posts, Tweets, podcasts, and many other types of Web content

Brief video (about 3 ½ minutes) will serve as an introduction to RSS

Tying things togetherIs your head spinning yet?It’s ok – Social Web technologies are largely

about having fun, but most importantly, they are about staying connected

Any one site (say, Twitter) may not be around forever

But the idea of short, rapid status updates has found its way into other Social Web technologies

Facebook’s latest redesign has a suspiciously Twitter-like home page when you log in!

Thank you and stay connected!