Thing #13: What are you doing?

First, watch Twitter in Plain English:



Twitter allows users to post 140 character updates, answering the question: “What are you doing?”. These posts are shared via the web to either the world or to the users’ friends.

Fred Stutzman, in his 12-Minute Definitive Guide, describes Twitter this way: Call it a microblog, a social presence tool, or whatever else you’d like–it does appear that Twitter is here to stay. As a tool with many flexible uses, it is likely that we’ll see individuals integrating Twitter with all sorts of interesting applications in the future. It is this simplicity and flexibility that makes Twitter a winner–in 140 characters or less.

Users can access Twitter messages — called Tweets — via the Web, via an RSS feed, and via text on their cellular phones or any number of third part apps. Stutzman divides uses into two areas: social updating and microblogging. Accessing a Twitter user, one might find an update on his or her day, a direct message to another Twitterer, or a bit of wit and wisdom.

Libraries are using Twitter as well as a means to update content on the Web or for alert services.

Discovery Resources:

• All a Twitter: Want to Try Microblogging? Elyssa Kroski’s recent article in School Library Journal.
  
  
• Learn More: Twitter from Steve Campion
  
  
• ArsTechnica on Twitter
  
  
• Seven Tips for New Twitter Users
  
  
• Twitter Search

Discovery Exercise:

1. Visit Twitter and sign up for a free account. Try a few tweets.

Use Ellyssa Kroski’s article and follow a few of the librarians listed there.

Follow one of us - Allana, Christa, Michael, or Susan.

Or follow the Nebraska Library Commission's NLC News or NLC Reference.

2. Search Twitter for mentions of your library, school or anything that interests you to explore how people use this tool. What conversations did you find?

3. Blog about the experience. Did you like micro-blogging? How could you libraries use Twitter? How could you use Twitter?