Nerve Endings Firing Away

The best (and worst) part of the whole Web 2.0 phenomenon is the constant infusion of new applications that purport to enhance social networking and netizen participation. While some of them are indeed useful, the vast majority are crap. I test drive a few every month and haven’t really warmed up to many. However, Twitter has impressed me the most. I have been playing around with it for the past couple of days.

In short, Twitter is a mobile social software that lets you publish and receive short messages with your network of ‘friends’ almost in the fashion that SMSes work over cell phones. You can use it with SMS, on the web or IM. As Kottke says, it is remniscent of blogging circa 2000 in a way that blogs started out being personal jottings meants for friends and family. Of course, the term ‘friends’ has now expanded to include people you interact with online and may have not even met in real life (people have been gotten married with less acquaintance.) The best part about Twitter is, it can be what you want it to be. Just like blogging. Although it was launched more than a year ago, Twitter hit big during this year’s SXSW in Austin when the A-listers adopted it in a big way. Some liken it to Dodgeball. It also can be like a stream of updates of the perennial question between friends – “what are you doing” or the ‘status’ option on Facebook.

You update your Twitter by entering words in a single text box that limits your entries to 140 character (no rambling posts). Think of it as creative one-liner updates, if you so wish. The best Twitter updates are the shortest ones. Of course, Twitter is not an app for a loner and it would be useless without any friends following your updates. Also, it is fun to follow your friends updates. Your friends may follow your updates or not regardless of whether you do. Of course, there are groups too such as ArsTechnica, BBC, Techmeme, etc. that posts Twitter-sized updates with embedded ‘TinyURL’ [make your blog posts Twitter-friendly using the TwitThis button.] Conventions are already springing up like @username as a way of saying something to someone visible to everyone. Since Twitter was first developed for the cell phone, you can even do everything from your phone without ever using the web.

An open API has led to a host of interesting hacks that enhances the Twitter experience. Twitterholic tracks the top 100 Twitter users in terms of followers. Twittermap displays recent Twitter messages on Google Maps. Twittervision is a global updates tool on Twitter displayed on a world map (you can spend hours watching that.) Mac users, use Twitterific, a little app that sits on your desktop and displays updates from your friends. Currently, there are some scalability issues (site may be slow at times) since Twitter became popular almost overnight but still there are less than 100,000 users. The Obvious Corporation however is planning on addressing those issues. In the meantime, even presidential aspirant John Edwards has joined in. This can be the next quick update tool in the information hungry world. Of course, it has its share of detractors as well. But nothing was accepted easily.

I’m already twittering away to glory (as if blogging wasn’t enough) and hope to see you around as well. Join Twitter and drop me a line. I already have nine friends and seven followers. It might just be the thing if you wanted to blog and didn’t have the time or inclination to do so.