the Vagabond Journalist

by Dan Rickershauser

My Twitter page. Twitter asks all users one question, "What are you doing?"

At 9:50 this morning I opened an account on Twitter. By 2 that afternoon, I had 8 followers, was following 21 others and had learned a great deal of interesting news from acquaintances along the way.

While I was once apprehensive about using Twitter, in part due its silly name, in a little over 4 hours of using it, I’ve found it to be quite a useful web tool.

Opening an account and the inaugural tweet

When opening an account for Twitter, you first need a user name, the equivalent of a screen name on instant messaging services. I chose @D4nRicks, the creative way to spell my name.

One of the complaints I have heard from other people starting a Twitter account, that the process to find people to follow is a little confusing. Unlike applications like Facebook, you don’t add “friends”. With Twitter, you find people to follow, with their updates and conversations between people broadcast for all to see. After starting up an account, Twitter encourages you to find others you may know through email address books. This can be confusing, or not of use for people who don’t have an email account with one of the selected email services.

After overcoming this confusion, I sent out my first “tweet” to the world, what a post is called in Twitterland.

“Just joined Twitter and getting the hang of it. Send me any comments on the role of twitter in your life, I’m writing an article on it,” it read.

The challenge with Twitter is keeping your messages under 140 characters, which can be challenging! My first “tweet” was 134, a struggle to keep it just under this requirement.

While it can be a vice, this can also be one of Twitter’s strengths. My first response to this question, from Pendulum editor Olivia Hubert-Allen(@hubertallen), talked about the simplicity of Twitter being one of its strengths.

“Twitter takes the burden out of blogging and let’s you communicate instantly with people with a single click,” she replied.

“Tweets” can be broadcast to all followers, or targeted towards a person using the “@” symbol, following the person’s username.

News from former coworkers

Also responding quickly to my first tweet was Aaron Strout (@astrout), a colleague where I interned this summer, Mzinga. Mzinga being a company that specializes in social media, Aaron and many other employees are frequent users of Twitter. Mzinga even broadcasts live Twitter-feeds during Webinars. It’s easy to see that Aaron has been a big advocate of Twitter, with an astounding 3,080 followers!

While using Twitter, I learned that Aaron had left Mzinga Oct. 31 to take up a job in Austin, Texas as Chief Marketing Officer of Powered. It was all big news that I had discovered through Twitter. While we are friends on Facebook and have each others email addresses, I was able to find this out using Twitter minutes after starting up my account.

Other happenings in the day of Twitter

I learned that Olivia Hubert-Allen had a eye doctor’s appointment and was getting her eyes dilated, which reminded us both of an episode of 90’s Nickelodeon cartoon “Rocko’s Modern Life”.

I discovered, through the Student Government Association at Elon University’s Twitter account (@ElonSGA), that on Oct. 12 they had passed legislation to request more temporary parking spots in Moseley Center parking lot, good news for any Elon student.

I found other classmates completing an assignment on Twitter open their own accounts.

After adding Rick Sanchez (@ricksanchezcnn), a CNN news anchor, I found out that he would be on vacation next week for the holiday. Rick Sanchez regularly broadcasts responses from the audience live through Twitter, a clever use of application.

Once a staunch critic of Twitter, I’ve found it to be useful. The only major downside is that most people my age have never heard or are not familiar with it!  It is also possible that another web application can come to fill the purpose of Twitter. Facebook’s status updates offer a similar concept. Only time will tell, but in my brief time using Twitter, I may have found yet another web tool worthy of my daily attention.

Related Articles

ABC News Story on how Comcast, a cable company, uses Twitter to scan for customer service complaints
Social Media Breakfast asks experts in social media how Twitter has changed their lives

Mashable’s post on the mainstream media and their use of Twitter

Miami Herald story on how Rick Sanchez of CNN uses Twitter and other new media on his television show

New York times story on why Twitter rejected Facebook’s $500 million offer

CNN story on Twitter’s role in reaction to the Mumbai Terror Attacks