I had never used Twitter. Honestly, I never liked the idea of Twitter. A constant flood of messages, none saying very much, seems like the opposite of what writers should strive for.
But the things you avoid have a way of finding you.
In the past week, I’ve gotten even more active in the Restore the Fourth movement. My focus has become less national and more local: I’m getting heavily involved in the Cleveland chapter. I don’t live near Cleveland, but it’s the only active chapter in Ohio. C’est la vie.
Recently I was given control of the official Twitter account for our local group.
When you’ve got a message to spread, you can’t afford to be picky about your medium. I learned how to use Twitter, and I learned fast.
So…how is it?
To some extent, it’s what I was afraid of. Twitter does emphasize quantity over quality, and I’m not crazy about that. And the constant stream of new content can make you a little ADHD if you let it.
Also, it causes otherwise respectable people to say “tweet” with alarming frequency.
On the other hand, I can see the appeal.
Twitter is more personal than other media, more connected. Where else but Patrick Stewart’s Twitter feed could I get pictures like this…or this?
But Twitter is more than a connection with any single person. It’s like a giant worldwide conversation, filled with the latest thoughts from National Geographic, Bill Nye, the New York Times, Levar Burton, Cory Doctorow, and/or whoever else you happen to be fascinated by.
If you think of it that way – as a conversation, a sort of filtered universal chat room – it starts to make more sense.
From a writer’s point of view, if you want to say something meaningful in a single (sigh) tweet, you have to really focus. Cut off the excess, hone your message down to its absolute core. It’s certainly possible. Hemingway allegedly wrote a short story in six words, so 140 characters is practically a novel.
Anyway, I’ve only been a Twit (Tweep? Tweeter? Twitterer?) for a few days. We’ll see how it goes.
Have you given in to the siren allure of the Twitternaut? What was your experience like?
Brian D. Buckley 
I joined Twitter earlier this year to see what it was about.
I have discovered a few new friends and some interesting websites, and had a few people come to my blog because of it.
It is definitely too large to read everything though; I use HootSuite to show different subsets so if I am in a hurry I can just check the accounts for which I want to read every tweet.
I may have to investigate that. I hear some of the Twitter apps make the whole experience a lot better.
Definitely.
Although nothing seems to solve the issue of some people tweeting the same message several times to stop it being lost in the flurry of people tweeting the same message several times to stop it being….
I joined twitter this year ax well, and i still have mixed feelings.
It’s odd, isn’t it? Such a subtle fusion of genius and brainlessness…