The Beauty of Twitter

Welcome back!

A couple days ago, I advised a follower on Twitter about the pros and cons of Aweber vs. iContact as email autoresponder clients.  The next thing I know, I’m getting a “tweet” from the CEO of Aweber, asking for my feedback.  My friend, Shawn Collins (who I met through Twitter), got faster customer service from Comcast through Twitter than by calling his local customer service line.  This little incident gained him national news coverage.  Twitter inspired this blog, enabled me to become part of a political podcast, developed great friendships with many people that inspire me to be a better person, provided opportunities for guest posts on other blogs, be among the first to hear news from around the world, and the list goes on. For me, though, Twitter is more about the experience than what you get from using it.

What is Twitter?
I try to explain Twitter to the uninformed and it usually falls on deaf ears.  It’s a very hard entity to explain to the uninitiated, but the beauty of Twitter never ceases to amaze me.  They call it micro-blogging, but that doesn’t really explain it fully.  It’s kind of like chat, but much more.  Many have created rules for Twitter, some good, some bad — either way, it doesn’t matter, because Twitter does not have official rules and I can stop following someone if I don’t want to hear what they have to say.

One thing that I believe is crucial to a quality Twitter experience is to add something to the conversation.  It’s not a selling platform or a bully pulpit.  It’s an ongoing conversation between microcosms.  On the flip side, don’t be afraid to jump into the abyss, if you have something to add.  This is how I’ve made most of my friends on Twitter.  You have to give first to get back.

Competition?
Many competitors have come along, the current one gaining momentum is Identi.ca.  Identi.ca has a good shot at Twitter with people like Leo Laporte moving over to this service from Twitter.  My friend, Sam Harrelson (another Twitter friend), does a much better job of explaining the advantages of Identi.ca over Twitter than I could ever hope to accomplish.  My challenge with Identi.ca lies with the fact that there are not enough people on Identi.ca, yet.

One of the most beautiful things about Twitter is the way it makes the world smaller.  My ability to follow and chat with movers, shakers, early-adopters, CEOs, and my neighbor makes Twitter work.  Without the immense number of people using Twitter, part of it’s charm disappears.

I get most of my news through Twitter and use it as an RSS reader, since most of the feeds I subscribe to have Twitter accounts, also.  CNN, FoxNews, and my local news stations all have Twitter accounts.  Both presidential candidates have Twitter accounts.  When I first began using Twitter, my part of Florida had a few pages of Twitter users (I think saying two pages would be generous).  Now, there are over fifty pages of Twitter users just in my city.

Although it has hit some speed bumps and stumbling blocks, Twitter continues to grow.  With desktop clients like Twhirl and TweetDeck (my personal favorite) improving the experience and mobile clients like TwitterBerry, Twitter continues to further entrench users in their platform, making it more difficult to turn away.  With Twhirl adding Identi.ca and FriendFeed support and TweetDeck doing the same, over time, some of these competitors may grab market share, but until the massive numbers of users begins to transfer over, the experience will never match Twitter.

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