Software, Software Development and other Atrocities

I’ve been on Twitter for over a year now and I have to say my opinion of it has changed a bit. http://clk0.blogspot.com/2009/08/this-is-what-i-think-about-twitter.html I joined when a friend of mine, Dr T, told me it was fun and that he found it extremely useful. I have to say that I find it useful too but perhaps not at the same level. Dr T’s experience has been quite different from mine.

Here I want to compare our two completely different Twitter experiences. Dr T’s has been extremely social, active and multi-dimensional whereas mine has been rather individual and uni-dimensional. Why has this happened? I guess that is because of our different original aims and motivations, and our behaviour.

On Twitter as in any other SNS you can create your own network of contacts and that network will define a great part of your future interactions. Depending on the time you devote to it you can build up a following list of people whose tweets you find interesting. Perhaps people who you think you would like to meet in real life! (and I am not talking about celebrities.) Dr T was keen on meeting new people and be part of something on Twitter. A group, a community? I was just curious and wanted access to information (news, trivia, etc.) I couldn’t (or didn’t have the time to) get by other means.

Dr T talks to people a lot. I just read tweets, broadcast a little and seldom address someone. Talking means using the @ symbol for example to address one or more people, means replying when they address you and means following threads of conversation. Conversations are extremely important to build online relationships. Conversations and socialisation in the online world basically mean the same. Conversations define the social in Social Networking.

Dr T tweets from his bed, his kitchen, his office, the gym, pubs, etc. I tweet from the office. Dr T uses Twitter in conjunction with other tools e.g., FourSquare, Tumblr, Facebook, etc. I cannot be bothered. He’s attended tweetups! and was part of a public Twitter art display. I found that amusing. He has tweeted 5 to 6 times more than me. He spends time looking after his following list and adding more people. He is much more conscientious of the people he follows and follow him. I do not have a strategy for following people. I don’t mind noise and I have never dedicated more than 2 minutes to check my following and followers lists. I follow people with different interests. Actually I do not have a topic per se but just follow random interesting people. I find people when they are referred to in tweets and sometimes when they talk to me. Many of the people I follow do not tweet more than once a week. Maybe that is why I do not get much noise! hmm No... Some of them tweet 24/7 but I am not watching 24/7.

The above just shows how different our online behaviour has been but the consequences of those behaviours have been even more dissimilar. Dr T has been able to build real friendships over Twitter. He has met some of these people and thinks they are cool. I, on the other had, haven’t been able to move beyond my computer screen. Not that I haven't tried. I tried mobile tweeting but got frustrated when the client's provider started to charge. I know. I could've looked for another client, but to be honest, I couldn't be bothered.

Update: I got Twitter on my mobile again. It took me a bit of time and a new mobile :)