I read Beth's recent blog entry on Twitter, and of course, the neo-luddite in me said "waste of time!" But then I had to think about it. What is it about Twitter that seems so, well, besides the point? Why aren't I Twittering away, like so many of my nptech colleagues?
One of the potential uses of Twitter is as a "back channel" for events and the like. So a conversation is happening, in a session, or in a plenary, and people are talking about that on another channel. IRC has always seemed to me to be one of the best ways to do that, but IRC is, well, passé these days, it seems. But why not add another channel to the back channel happenings, for instance, at NTC? Sounds like a reasonable idea.
But why don't I sign up for a Twitter account, and, well, Twitter? First off, it doesn't fit into my workflow. My workflow does involve the web, for sure, but I can only keep up with so many social networking sites of varied uses (social bookmarking, social networking like Linked in, community blogs etc. etc.) before I'm spread far to thin, and Firefox starts piling the tabs into a menu. Then there is the overhead of signing up for an account, and then inviting people, and linking, and blah blah, just so I can tell people what I am doing at the moment. Huh?
And then there is data. We all talk about information overload. Give me tools, like Yahoo Pipes, or other kinds of things, that help me to whittle down the information I'm taking in - make it more useful, help me find things faster and easier. I love my friends and colleagues. Really, I do. But, for the most part, I really don't want to know what they are doing right now. I need less, and better data, not more.
And there is more: it might keep me at my computer longer. It will use up server resources at some server farm which uses electricity (which means, probably burning dirty coal, or natural gas). Using servers that took a huge amount of energy and water to manufacture. All this so a bunch of people can tell each other what they are doing. And, I'm sorry, but "Insert_web.20_new_thing to change the world!" just doesn't cut it for me.
Wanna know what I'm doing? Check my Skype status. Or IM me. Those windows are already open, and I use them everyday. But sorry, I'm not Twittering.
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