Back in April, 2007, I first blogged about the early emergence of Twitter.  It’s since become a fundamental “must have” tool to the media and silicon valley crowd.  Not using Twitter is akin to carrying a Motorola Razr phone at Web 2.0!

Following my innate tendency to pick up shiny new objects, I joined Twitter a few months ago.  I was a reluctant laggard by silicon valley standards - the advertised premise of telling everyone “what are you doing?” didn’t sit well with me. Broadcasting to the world where I stop for a drink, or when I’m waiting for a plane seemed to be on the time-wasting side of social media, not to mention feeling a tad narcissistic.

And now I’m hooked.

I tried to deconstruct the experience, and help reveal what I see as the power and promise of Twitter.

a definition too narrow

Twitter is emerging as a utility that goes well beyond the stated “what are you doing?” description.  I know that a lot of people use it as a personal status update tool for their social network, but for me the use value of Twitter is elsewhere, and it’s higher up the value chain.

Here is how it adds value to my life/work:

“here’s a thought”

I am increasingly drawn to Twitter as a way of observing and exploring the reactions and thoughts of key “opinion leaders” in the industry. Guys like Tim O’Reilly, Jay Rosen and Fred Wilson use Twitter to pass along things they find interesting - articles they digest, reactions to events, and ideas that pop into their head. The resulting nuggets of insight make it a useful and somewhat addictive tool.

Think of it as a socially acceptable eaves-dropping application. To me, the “synaptic nature” of Twitter feels intuitively conversational - exchanging observations and passing along thoughts - and more engaging than the current generation of news feeds and comment systems.

The simplicity of the interface makes Twitter a surprisingly efficient way to scan information coming from dozens of sources. The spartan format forces you to make a point with no more than 140 characters. It’s kind of refreshing, and easier to digest than an increasingly noisy page full of news on news readers and consumer portals. As the people and publications that I follow move their news and thoughts onto Twitter, the less I rely on news readers.

micro-blogging

The blogging world seems to have embraced Twitter. It’s been observed that bloggers who adopt Twitter dramatically reduce the quantity of blog posting.

This is a very positive evolution, I believe.  Over the years, bloggers have dominated their postings with simple - “hey, this is an interesting article” notes, with a link.  While that’s interesting, it’s inefficient; Twitter takes that slice of the blog world, and makes it efficient.  It’s the evolution of a better tool, and it makes the blog a less noisy place focused on more thoughtful or detailed musings and conversations.  Some day, I’ll get around to getting my blog redesigned so that my Twitter streams re-publish into these pages.

“news, as it happens”

The blogging media seem to have gotten hooked on Twitter as a way of reporting and socializing breaking news.  I found myself increasingly turning to Twitter when the DNC was in town - it feels a lot more alive than “traditional online media” sources. The political commentary on the RNC has also proven to be an eclectic and interesting mix of insight and political humor.

As an “alert” media, it works well.

the emerging social conversation interface

To me, Twitter is another exciting dimension of the morphing “live web”.  It takes the fundamental conversational value of connected users to a new level of experience and consumption.

Twitter elegantly connects into the mobile/sms world, which gives it added value to my media lifestyle/habits.  This media is naturally mobile, and has quickly become one of the most used information browsing tools on my mobile.

Twitter exemplifies the morphing of the spaces currently occupied by email, IM, SMS, news readers and personal portals. I’ve long believed that the consumer interface is undergoing a complete rewrite. The conventions of “checking your mail” and “personal portals” will give way to new personalized experiences of information and personal interactions that define your information consumptions and conversations.

Exactly how this evolution occurs is anybody’s bet right now.  Twitter still has an incredibly small user base. Further, it is highly predictable that the basic concept underlying twitter is being fashioned into future versions of mail, messaging, portal and mobile interfaces by all of the alpha dogs of consumer media, search and communications.

I would expect Twitter is more likely be absorbed into bigger agenda players than not. The concept can really gain traction and leverage when married with the user and content publishing mass. While the average consumer may not be engaged by the current ecosystem participants, when you turn Twitter loose on other information ecosystems - take sports, for instance, you will probably see a really interesting growth trajectory into mainstream usage.

twitter around me?

Twitter is being actively “mashed up” with geo-location to form early demonstrations of new social mobile applications.  Interesting/exciting stuff for the future of LBS-based consumer applications.  I’ll save that for another post, this one is already long!.

fyi, you can find me on twitter as perryevans

Posted by Perry on Friday, September 5th, 2008 at 4:24 am.