Tuesday, March 03, 2009

Twitter: do you know where you going to?

I was just listening to Evan Williams and he described how Twitter ended up being what they never thought it would become. First let's start with what they thought Twitter would be for. It was created to share trivial things in about 140 characters or less like "I'm mad. couldn't find a decent single bathroom while running errands downtown". What's interesting about these updates is that lots of people may receive them instantly! Thus, reducing the distance among people around the world. Isn't that neat? Here's what Twitter is becoming: 1. Twitter in Real time events,say, Hurricane Katerina. 2. Twitter for businesses (marketing) 3. Twitter for politics (Barackobama) Users' contribution to Twitter: 1. Using the syntax @profile to reply to someone (this was later built into Twitter system to made it easier to twitterers) 2. Using APIs. This means that programmers can write software that interacts with twitter. For example, a fetal kick detector that twitters when baby kicks , Kickbee, plants twittering to owners, real time Twitter search. 3. Using Twitter to help each other out (e.g. raising money for homeless people). What was not mentioned in Evan Williams's talk is that Twitter can be used: 1. for conferences 2. to broadcast news 3. to announce events 4. to provide updates on new web 2.0 tools (as some EFL teachers do) It was interesting to listen to Evan Williams talking about Twitter because it shows how people has stretched the possibilities of web 2.0 tools like Twitter to other applications or uses.



Twitter Drawback (at least in Venezuela):
I wonder why in Venezuela, South America, we cannot use Twitter in our cell phones. For some reason, we have been denied the pleasure of fully enjoying this web service. BTW, same thing happens with some other web services like Amazon; no video downloads are allowed . I wonder why? I feel frustrated every time I read "This is only available for such and such countries (generally Europe or the States)". Reducing the digital divide?
 
Twitter Glossary:  
Twitter (noun): the micro-blogging web service
(to) twitter (verb): to update messages via PC or cell phone.  
Tweets (noun): people's posts  
Twitterer: the one who twitters  
*Tweeps: Twitter people / followers  
*Tweet exhaustation: the flooding, never ending tweets
Tworn: Twitter porn
Twammer: Twitter spammer  

Twitter & education:
A teacher's guide to Twitter
Microblogging in Education
Educational tool: Twitter
50 ideas on using Twitter for education
Twitter in higher education
Directory of Learning Professionals on Twitter Word a day 

Graham Stanley' six things
Teaching with Twitter
 
More on Twitter 
The always irreverent but smart Chris Pirillo suggests 10 ways to use Twitter.  
Twhirl: A desktop client for social software such as Twitter  
Tweet Penguin: Find new Twitter followers with similar interests  
Tweet Exhaustation: An interesting article on why people can feel overwhelmed with Twitter and how to overcome this.
Filesocial: To upload documents and share with other tweeps.  
Twitstory: to back up your tweets
TwHistory: To learn about North American history in 140 words. 
Twitter Hashtags: Learn how to use hashtags

8 comments:

Anonymous said...

Hey thanks for a mention in your post. I'm really excited to see all the ways people are adapting and using Twitter. There seems to be a lot of different adaptations for it.

Interesting blog too by the way.

Miguel Mendoza said...

YW, Christine. That's our job to spread the word! Love listening to your experience using Twitter!

Unknown said...

Hola Miguel


Many thanks for putting the Exeter Online banner on your blog.

I hope you can all join us for the online conference and by the way...

we'll be doing some interesting things with twitter at the Cardiff Conference (http://iatefl.britishcouncil.org/2009/)

You can follow us on http://twitter.com/iateflonline

Best wishes

Julian & Cardiff Online team

m said...

I am libardo gonzalez creator of the blog www.yourteachertrainer.blogspot.com where I am also showing the IATEFL icon, I just want to invite you to go there and find many interesting resources for this weblog.
take care
libardo

Anonymous said...

A test

Facility manager said...

Hola, interesante blog. Llego por edublogs y me gustaría seguir en contacto, amigo.
Te espero por el mio
Alberto

KALINAGO ENGLISH said...

Hi Mike

Very useful post with many gr8 tips on how to understand and utilize Twitter best - hadn't see this post earlier.

Sorry to hear you can't use it on your mobile phone though must confess that I have consciously chosen not to have twitter on my phone for fear of increasing my dependency on the app ;-)

Take care,
Karenne

Miguel Mendoza said...

Hey!

Thanks for your comments...And that's something I haven't thoguht about it...Twitter can be a bit addictive:)

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