To tweet or not to tweet?

Aditha DISSANAYAKE

A useful addition to the web or simply another Facebook-like black hole that sucks away at our free time? Nobody knows, but when the big decision does arrive, it is likely to be Twittered before it hits the rest of us.

Sri Lankan ‘Tweeps’ meet at ‘TweetupSL’

TweetupSL is the name given for the first ever large-scale meet-up for Twitter users in Sri Lanka. A Tweetup gives the Twitter users the opportunity to put a face to the name or rather the Tweep they network with online. The first ever TweetupSL was held on August 26, 2010 in Colombo. Though the initial registration confirmed the participation of about 80, the final turnout was over 100 tweeps [“Tweeps” is a term (derived from ‘peeps’) used for people who are on Twitter]. This year’s TweetupSL 2 was held in August and saw the participation of the very young and well as the not so young Sri Lankan Twitterers.

Last month, in an interview given to the New York Times, the 64-year-old Brazilian novelist Paulo Coelho, admitted he is addicted to it. “Yes, I confess, in public. I (do it) in the morning and the evening. It’s my relaxing time.” On Father’s Day this year, President Barack Obama did something his Internet fans have long dreamed of: He sent a Father’s Day message in his own words for the first time via the @BarackObama account. “Being a father is sometimes my hardest but always my most rewarding job,” wrote President Obama. “Happy Father’s Day to all the dads out there”. American journalist Maureen Dowd vows she will not have one even if it means having red ants eating her eyes out.

Closer to home, web developer, Nazly Ahmed says he cannot live without it. He confesses “It’s a part of my life now.” For Amitha Amarasinghe,who thinks we live in a ‘knowledge society’ where ‘Know-who’ is more important than ‘Know-how’ it is an educational tool that will help you to expand your circle of knowledgeable people. But perhaps no one else sees it with such intense passion as Laurie Ashton Farook aka @LMAshton. “I love it. Love, love, love it. I think the people who created it are nothing short of geniuses.” When she has a question that search engines fail to solve, from identifying Sri Lankan birds, to understanding a Sri Lankan recipe, she is sure she will find useful suggestions here.

As for me, the most embarrassing moment in my recent past was due to this comparatively new form of communication known as ‘microblogging’ that restricts each entry to 140 characters called a “short trivial burst of information similar to what bird’s do”.i.e Twitter.

It so happened I was being treated to a glass of orange juice in a five star hotel by my banker cum tech geek cousin when I decided I would like to ‘tweet about my juice’. But the more I tried the harder I found it to send a new message to my ‘followers’ on Twitter. Why? Why? Why? Why does Twitter confuse me so?

My cousin eventually told me that the button in the top right corner of the Twitter application is used to create a new message. Pressing it, I began to write, “I am loving my orange juice with ...” and then I stopped.

Amitha Amarasinghe

Nazly Ahmed

Laurie Ashton Farook

“How do I include your name in the Tweet?” I asked him. “Is it the @ symbol, then a space, then your name?” He explained that the @ symbol cannot have a space, and that I had to write his Twitter username, not just his given name.

I suppose it is alright to admit it. After all, I am among friends. I have been on Twitter for more than a year now and I still cannot figure out how to tweet.

Coming to grips with @ symbols, hash-tags and compressing the whole world into hundred and forty characters are feats beyond me.

“Relax” says Farook. Obviously I am not alone in this predicament. “Twitter in Sri Lanka is still, for the most part, an unknown quantity.” Laurie’s words are comforting. “The Sri Lankans who are on Twitter tend to be the geeks, those who are into programming and the rest of the tech scene.” This is fine for Laurie as she admits she too is a geek herself. But what about non geeks like me?

Try, try and try,so they say (within the cage of the 140 character limit), the first pancake is always a flop. It is worth the effort. Ahmed sees Twitter as a bridge that connects people from all over the world. “Twitter is one of the greatest tools to network with people. With a very basic mobile phone in hand, you can engage in conversations with people ranging from key personalities to your colleague in the next cubicle. You get to know a lot of people with whom you can share a wealth of knowledge and information”. Ahmed recalls a quote he once read, “A Facebook friend is someone you went to school with, A Twitter follower is someone you wish you went to school with”. Twitter has broken down most of the barriers in communication and has bridged people across the globe.”

Amarasinghe agrees. “Twitter is a simple but powerful tool for like-minded people to share their thoughts. If used correctly, Twitter is a great tool to receive precise and relevant information on topics which interest you”. Nevertheless, “if used incorrectly, it could turn out to be the worst nightmare of information overload.” he warns.

So, if you just had a “yummy juice!” write a text saying so (because Twitter keeps asking you What are you doing?) on your phone and tell everyone on your Twitter list. This vital information will also be posted on your Twitter webpage, where people can read it and bask in the radiant glow of your happy and successful life.

Still skeptical? Why should you bother if someone you do not know (or do know) just enjoyed a glass of juice.? Don’t you have better things to do? Like “watchin TV” or “waterin d plants” or “goin 2 d libry. LOL!” Turns out, though, that there are some serious enterprise uses for Twitter and a growing number of entrepreneurs are using it to promote themselves. Chances are you can use Twitter to tell the world about your business as well as your “ymmy juice. Wotev.”

Moreover, Twitter has immediacy. “I get breaking news in my twitter stream faster than a lot of news sites even pick it up.” says Farook. “Since I don’t watch TV news, read newspapers, or otherwise regularly visit online news sites except through links in Twitter, this means I’m not as out of touch as I would be otherwise.”

Twitter also gives everyone the option of making discussions, public. You cannot do this with e-mail, and it is difficult to accomplish on a blog. If you believe that your exchange with others would benefit from public input, or if you just want to expose the discussion to others, you have that option.

But what about the frustrating 140 character limit? Frustrating? No, say veteran Twitterers. They see the 140-character ‘prison’ as liberating because it helps you to share quick thoughts that are worth sharing with others but that don’t justify an email or a blog entry.

So, would Shakespeare have tweeted? Ask one of the inventors of Twitter, Biz Stone and have him say “Brevity’s the soul of wit”.

It is hard not to conclude with some of the questions Maureen Dowd asked Biz when she met him and Evan Williams to find out if the inventors of Twitter were as annoying as their invention. (They are not. They are charming she observed)

Maureen: You say the brevity of Twitter enhances creativity. Twitter seems like telegrams without the news...Is there any thought that doesn’t need to be published?

Biz: The one I’m thinking right now.

Maureen: I would rather be tied up to stakes in the Kalahari Desert, have honey poured over me and red ants eat out my eyes than open a Twitter account. Is there anything you can say to change my mind?

Biz: Well, when you do find yourself in that position, you’re gonna want Twitter. You might want to type out the message “Help.”

He could be right.

[email protected]