Twitter

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Twitter is a social networking and micro-blogging service that allows its users to send and read other users' updates (known as tweets), which are text-based posts of up to 140 characters in length.

For more of the Wikipedia definition - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Twitter

Twitter will be the primary mode of communication for participants in this course.

Assignment -

1. Don't Panic.  The following 10 steps are designed to give you a feel for how Twitter works.  Most of them can be completed quickly. 
2. Go to http://twitter.com and set up an account.

   For a 2 minute tutorial on how to set up a Twitter account, view the first episode of Twitter for Beginners on Butterscotch.

3. Follow our class twitter account -  http://twitter.com/mtlib20 by clicking on this link and then clicking on the Follow button.  This is a restricted account set up just for this class so you will have to be approved as a follower.  We're only doing this to make it easier for you to find and follow other class participants.
4. Click on Followers on the right hand side.  You should eventually find all of your classmates and course instructors listed.  Follow them.
5. You can choose to get a message sent to the email address you provided whenever someone new follows you.  If it's someone in the class, you will certainly want to follow them as well.  If it's someone you don't know, you can click on the link to look at their profile to decide whether or not you'd be interested in receiving their updates.  In rare cases, you may choose to block someone as a follower.
6. Update your profile and preferences.  A photo or avatar is always a nice touch.  Some experienced twitterers won't follow you if you haven't updated your photo and profile. 

   I would recommend that you not restrict access to your updates for this class.  It just makes the whole process more cumbersome.  If you decide to stay with Twitter after the class and feel more comfortable in a restrictive setting, by all means.  But for class purposes, let's be open.

   For more information on how to set preferences, view the fourth episode of Twitter for Beginners on Butterscotch.

   For more information on how to customize your profile, view the fifth episode of Twitter for Beginners on Butterscotch.

7. Read one or more of the articles in the Delicious links and post a tweet about it of 140 characters or less.  It will go out to all of your followers.

   For more information on how to use Twitter to send updates, view the sixth episode of Twitter for Beginners on Butterscotch.

8. Reply to someone else's tweet.  Send a direct message to someone.  Note: you can only send a direct message to someone who follows you.

   For more information on keeping track of replies and direct messages with Twitter, view the seventh episode of Twitter for Beginners on Butterscotch.

9. You may also want to check out who the people you follow are following.  This is social networking after all, and that's a great way to extend your network.

   You'll find other Montana librarians, librarians and educators from around the country and world, libraries, professional organizations, news and media outlets, elected officials...  You can also Find People via email or name or user name.

   For more information on Finding Friends, view the second episode of Twitter for Beginners on Butterscotch.

10. #Hashtags are a way of making Twitter discussions easily searchable.  For an example of how this looks go to http://search.twitter.com/ and type in #klampla.  You can see Twitter comments posted about the recent MPLA conference in Wichita, KS.  For this course we'll use the tag #mtlib20.  Include in class-related discussions.

    For more information on searching Twitter, view the ninth episode of Twitter for Beginners on Butterscotch.

11. Find and follow a few libraries on Twitter.  Post to your blog how these libraries use Twitter and how effective you think their use is.  How might your library use Twitter?  Share your blog posting with your Twitter followers by:

• Including the URL for this blog post in a tweet.  It's helpful to shorten it first.  The applications below include ways to shorten URLs or you can shorten it yourself using TinyURL or bit.ly OR
• Share all your class blog postings by setting up a Twitterfeed.

   

More Information/Applications

If you decide that you like Twitter and want to keep using it after this course concludes, you'll probably want to check out one of the many available Twitter applications to make it easier to read and update from your desktop or mobile device. 

• Twitterific - for Mac OSX 10.4 or later as well as iPhone and iPod Touch. $14.95 for full version, free version has ads.
• Twhirl - Free works on Windows and Mac.  The plus with this one is you can open to multiple Twitter accounts.
• Tweetdeck - Free works on Windows and Mac.  My current favorite because it allows you to sort into groups.
• Twitterberry - the most popular Twitter application for Blackberry.
• Tweetie - $2.99 from the iTunes apps store for iPhone and iPod Touch.

Most of these applications also provide easy ways to shorten URLs which is very convenient if you use Twitter to share resources with friends and colleagues.

There are also a number of software applications that help make better use of Twitter.

• Twitpic - share photos on Twitter
• Twitterfeed - feed your blog to Twitter.  Do you have more to say than the 140 character limit?  Then you can set up a Twitterfeed so your blog updates can be shared with your Twitter followers.
• Twollo - find and follow fellow Twitterers with interests similar to yours.  I'd go easy with this one but it is interesting.  I prefer the suggestions from @twollo than the automatic following.  I chose the far too common term "library" and ended up following a number of people who were not affiliated with libraries.
• Tweepular - enables you to evaluate your Twitter following and followers.
• Ping.fm - looking for ways to update all of your web 2.0 apps at once?  Try Ping.fm.

There are also ways to use Twitter to update your Facebook page and vice versa.  Watch for more information from the social networking section.

For additional applications and Twitter-related articles, view my Delicious links.

And a big thanks to the people at Butterscotch.com for their helpful tutorials.