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Tweet, tweet, twitter , twitter

Rick Strahl writes up his thoughts on Twitter - Twitter this, Twitter that... - Rick Strahl's Web Log

I've been on Twitter for a while as well (started for keeping up with Newsgator and BuzzOutLoud items) and completely agree with his quote:
"Since I'm a single developer shop and live in sort of a bubble on a far away island (or a small town on the mainland when I'm back there) Twitter is  providing a little more sense of being a part of greater community to me."

(albeit, I'm not on an island but then...we all can't be so lucky)

For those who aren't familiar with Twitter, it's a microblog (limited to 140 character posts) where you follow (and are followed) others.  Just as blogs have their "if I was a tree" posters, they also have some really insightful "twitterers".

People post just about anything on twitter so it can seem weird in some cases. I typically identify with those posts about "checking in lots of code" or the feeling of triumph "I am an XML god" after resolving a particular problem.

( someone did note that I was particularly "busy" twittering when in fact, I had only posted a few times - but to those who are unfamiliar with updating their "state" regularly, it does appear as you are "busy" - especially on tools like Facebook where your latest twitter can appear.)

While there definitely can be a lot of noise,  I find Twitter particularly useful for connecting to other things that are of interest where a blog post would be overkill.
Some examples:
  I found jquery.com based on Rick's single tweet "this is how it should be".
  Evernote - found via Rhonda Tipton  - as opposed to the various media reviews
  a number of great links on innovative writing , development videos, development concepts ( I follow devs who do just about every kind of dev, not just VFP) and hey, you can even help others with their writing.

It's also a great way of announcing posts of interest to others that may be outside your direct circle.

Many people like to keep their blogs very specific to a particular topic - twitter allows those people to still point to items that are out of that specialty but may still be of interest.

As a client - Myself, I use twhirl, which has made using Twitter very fast and easy.

I think I may start reducing the number of "noise" blogs I subscribe to since those "noise-makers" typically "tweet" as well.

Can it be a time-waster? Yes - but that's what discipline is for. For me, it sits in the background (I don't use the SMS features - part of what makes Twitter so popular) - but if someone posts to me directly (which they can with an @akseloft), I am told about it - and otherwise I can just quickly review.

140 characters also forces you to be fairly succinct in your posts...now please excuse me while I tweet that "I am posting a post on twitter" <bg>

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