Skeptical of Twitter?
Twitter is truly an amazing gem. A waste of many a person’s time, no doubt; but an uninhibited informational Audubon nonetheless.
When I first joined Twitter I was skeptical. Here in the Inland Northwest it hasn’t really caught on. Very few of my friends have it, but I couldn’t ignore how the web is constantly vibrating because of it. I didn’t have a single “good” reason to set up a Twitter account. Naturally, I did it anyway.
(Skip next paragraph and read “The Validity of Twitter” if you already know what Twitter is about)
For those of you who don’t know what Twitter is, it is minimalistic little site that focuses on only one question: “What are you doing?” You are allowed only 140 characters to do just that. Your 140 character messages are called tweets and you can send them from the web or from your mobile device. You follow other people and they can follow you. Your tweets only go to your followers. The amazing thing is that some Twitter users have over 50,000 people following them! Talk about reaching a massive population with ease! The average Twitter user probably has around 1,000. My purpose with this post is not to explain Twitter but to give insight into how I discovered it’s validity. Where the “rubber meets the road” if you will.
For a great explanation of Twitter, go here. To set up your very own Twitter account, go here.
The Validity of Twitter
So, at what point did Twitter become valid for me? When I discovered how effortlessly information travels through and due, to it.
The scenario:
It’s late morning on January 15th, and I’m sitting in my office having an early lunch. My business is tucked away in a commercial business park and I was the only person around. I logged onto Twitter and noticed a guy I was following posted an interesting tweet. His name was Robert Scoble.
Roberts “tweet” was as follows: Tons of people are reporting a USAir plane crash in NYC. Followhttp://search.twitter.com for more.
A plane crash in NY????
Here is the time-line (Pacific standard time) and how I responded:
- 12:46 P.M. - 1st picture of plane posted to web by Janis Krums. No rescuers on scene yet. He took the pic (with iphone) from 1st rescue boat while en-route to Flight 1549.
- 12:48 P.M. - I saw Scoble’s tweet and verified it through the link he gave. Sure enough, thousands were reporting an airplane in the Hudson River.
- 12:52 P.M. - I sent a tweet out to all of my followers (about 250) that a plane was down in NYC.
- 12.55 P.M. - I sent another tweet with a link to streaming video on CNN.
I still can’t find a valid time that Flight 1549 went into the water but, based on J. Krums photo, it couldn’t have been before 12:40 P.M. Remember, he was on very 1st rescue boat and was only a short distance away when he snapped the now famous pic and uploaded it to Flickr. So, within 2 minutes of photo going online, I had knowledge of the situation. 3,000 miles away! Within 6 minutes I had reported info to all of my followers and within 9 minutes I had relayed a link for streaming video on CNN. We may be seeing the metamorphisis of “Media” right before our very eyes.
By the time I had knowledge of Flight 1549 going down, the news hadn’t yet hit Yahoo news and many other major news outlets (CNN being an exception). \
Ponder what an amazing tool Twitter can be in case of national emergencies, local emergencies, amber alerts, family emergencies, etc. Emergencies are but one facet of Twitter’s validity. And valid Twitter is, despite it’s naysayers and time-wasters.
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