I've been on Twitter for a few weeks now, and I have decided that I am sold on it as a way to communicate and network with people. A number of M-Brane writers are also regular users of it, and I think it would be great if more were. I am also pretty pleased that I started tweeting just days before discussion of Twitter became all-pervasive in the media on every TV and radio talk show because I felt like I was finally somewhat up-to-date on something.
Despite my endorsement of Twitter in principle, I would offer a word of warning to people who haven't started using it yet but are considering it: there is a clear and present danger of it being a hypnotic time-waster. You really have to watch out for that. It has happened to me a number of times already where I somehow, without even realizing it, transition from doing some legitimate work on the computer to mindlessly staring at the Twitter screen, refreshing it every five seconds, waiting to see what someone might say. And then waiting some more.
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9 comments:
Ok, I'm gonna actually help you out here! :) Download the Adobe Air application Tweetdeck (you have to install adobe air first, which is cross platform)... you don't even have to log onto the twitter site and you see updates in real time. Very cool application.
Twitterfox is a plugin for firefox. Another option.
Thanks for the tips guys. Another thing I don't quite get how to do is make those shortened URLs for links to other sites. Is that something I'm just not seeing in the Twitter app itself or something supported by these plug-ins, or do I need something else entirely?
Many of our dinner conversations have been along the lines of Chris trying to relate twitter experiences while my eyes glaze over then me dissing tweeting while Chris and Jeff make no attempt to defend it to the sadly uninitiated.
So, ok, I'll try to make a go of it. I better see for myself exactly how much is about pajamas to the store and how much is just silly;) That bit alone is enough to sign up...
Now that Pat has caved, it's obvious that Twitter is the new black.
tweetburner is the site I use to shorten links, but tweetdeck does it too I think
TweetDeck is up and running on my machine right now. Thanks for the tip, Brandon. I didn't try it yet, but it does have a "shorten URL" thing right under where one types in a tweet. Also, the install was quick and easy--I didn't actually have to do anything specific about installing Adobe Air first. It just did it as part of the process.
We have the same disease. I pop in to check twitter and the next minute (or rather hour) quite a lot of time has flown by.
Cate, I've only had it for a few hours, but I already recommend getting TweetDeck (see Brandon's first comment above). It displays your friends tweets and @ replies to you side by side...and it just sits there and updates itself every minute without you having to do anything. Not that you can't still waste a lot of time like that...
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