Facebook will be updating its user's home pages very soon, and much has already been made about how these pages are going to become more Twitter-esque in appearance and functionality. Status updates and postings from friends will now take center stage, updating in real time. The tour of the updated home page looks very cool; it's like Twitter on steroids. I'm excited to see what it will look and feel like when it's released, and how it will be used by those on the Book.
But I don't think Facebook or Twitter will immediately dominate the other company for their user base anytime soon. The updated FB home page presents a major shift in the way social network home pages have been used up to now, and it may take some time for people to shift away from the Twitter, and put all their eggs in the FB basket. I could be completely wrong, so it will be interesting to see what happens. But the different types of networks and the strengths of the ties people have with one another on Twitter vs. Facebook may present a challenge to any FB/Twitter plan for FB/Twitter/World dominance.
Here's why: On Twitter, my profile is kind of a sidenote. Not much is made of it by users, and it's not something we look at or groom. It's more like a concise business card providing a little insight into who we are. We can post and never reply to anyone if we wish. When we follow/unfollow/block a fellow Twitterer, it's just opening and closing different pipes of communication. Who follows me or who I follow may something about who I am, but probably doesn't, so I don't think you can assign to much relevance to the connections, as people are just opening and closing circuits to find posts they're interested in.
Many times the follower/following people have never met each other in real life, or even communicated directly with one another on Twitter. Also, networks of communication come and go . Networks of communication are established ad-hoc on Twitter based on common interest areas, goals, and shared experiences. For example: People may only tweet at a conference, because everyone else is. Or at that conference was the only time people had a common interest/goal to tweet with each other about. People come and go on Twitter, and there's a ton of people tweeting, so we get to maintain some level of anonymity.
In a nutshell: Twitter's a personality subscription service that enables ad-hoc interest networks to form and share information. The networks are very dynamic and subject to rapid change.
On Facebook, I have to request a friendship, I have to say how I know that person, they have to confirm and agree to the connection. I may have to provide an email address as proof of my participation in a group. There are lots of pictures of us; some posted by us, some posted by others, we get tagged. Our profiles include much richer information that we enter ourselves when we set up our home pages. We tailor that info for our audience, which includes our families, our friends, our coworkers; all people who get to see each other once we're "friends". These connections have a lot of relevance as they're people we interact with in everyday life, or have interacted with seriously at some point in life.
There's ZERO anonymity, the connections are much more meaningful, and the connections are much more static. The connections I have on FB I had long before there ever was a FB, and will be with me for the rest of my life. These links include shared history and experience that motivate us to stay in touch, either willfully or by obligation. These connections also have levels of trust and reputation associated with them.
Twitter to me is like going to the pub after work, or to a party on Saturday night. You meet up with a group of people. This group may include people you know, maybe not. You have a few drinks, talk a bunch of smack, tell jokes, do something crazy, then go home... to Facebook.
Facebook's where I present my best face. I may not want my Mom or the CEO from my company to know who I was with at the pub. I may not want them to know what we we're talking about earlier, or the jokes that were told, that information could be completely inappropriate for them.
So though Facebook's updated home page and Twitter's standard functionality may look similar, they actually support different groups of people with different motivations. Knowing this, it'll be very interesting to see what happens in the future with their services and what action each company takes to support and capitalize off of its respective audience.
Monday, March 9, 2009
Sunday, March 8, 2009
Twitter, Networks, and Finding What I'm Looking For
I thought I'd try and put some of my thoughts on Twitter out there in-a-nutshell style. Enjoy!
Twitter 101
Twitter is a worldwide party that everyone's been invited to. Throughout the duration of the party, people come and go. While present, people contribute to conversations and the party in general in the form of mini blog posts called "tweets". You show up and can choose to walk around and enter/check-out the conversations at will. You can listen to what people have to say, or you can participate and give back by posting your own tweets.
You listen in by choosing to "follow" someone. People have the option of not letting you listen in, and can insure you/others won't ruin their existing conversations with inappropriate remarks by not following and/or "block"ing you. Likewise, if you follow someone and they turn out to be a jackass, or talk about things you don't really care about, you can choose to not follow them anymore as well. In this way you can control the endless stream of information that's generated in tweets by those in attendance and tailor the flow of communication to meet to your personal requirements/desires/etc.
Score-Double-Bonus-Action: You know when you go to a real party, and you're standing with a group of people having a great conversation, and some jackass keeps interrupting with something that's inappropriate, a downer, or just plain offensive? Well, imagine if you had a mute button for that person. Or how about when the conversation you were previously interested in has deteriorated to a point where you want to just walk away, but don't want to seem rude in doing so? Well, Twitter provides us with both options and both are acceptable behavior in Twitterville. Sweet!
I call them conversations, and sometimes they are. We can reply to each other on twitter and when we reply, its a direct reply to the original tweeter as well as a remark shared with those following the conversation. Others may choose to chime in with their own replies, either directly addressing a person, or just contributing to the conversation in general by tagging their comment with a #identifier. Many times though, a "conversation" is very one-sided; it's really a broadcast. (You always have people at the party who talk to show off and/or hear themselves speak, but don't really care or know how to listen to what others have to say.) After you've "follow"ed several people, you really end up using the follow/nofollow/block options to help harvest the large river of broadcasts you want to subscribe too/participate in.
Technology + People = Twitter
I won't say Twitter is simple technology. And simple does not mean easy. Digging a ditch is simple but not easy. You have a shovel, some dirt, you dig, simple right? Well, you're going to get calluses and blisters, the Sun's going to beat down on you, you'll hit rocks as you dig: Not easy stuff! So while Twitter's UI and communication mechanisms seem simple, we know there are some serious challenges too keeping the river of communication flowing, and major props go to the Twitter team there! The mechanisms provided by Twitter that enable people of shared interest to communicate with and find each other are just enough. The rest of the magic and awesomeness that is Twitter and the reason many find it so useful and valuable is really delivered through the people and their tweets.
People who tweet are usually bringing something to the party, in the form of sharing news, information, insights, links to blog posts, and/or other resources that we're all interested in (globally and locally). Some of that info has no other source than word of mouth, and Twitter gives people a real-time broadcast mechanism for information that might otherwise not be reported until later (or at all).
Back to our real party analogy: You know those people/friends who always show up to the party with something to share: beer/jokes/stories to tell/food, etc.? And then there are those who tend to always be the mooches? Well, I haven't found too many mooches on Twitter. Also, if there's a fire down the street, someone usually enters the party and says "did you know so-and-so's home is on fire?". You learn about it then and there and can take action if required, as opposed to learning about it the next day in the paper, online, etc. or when the fire eventually spreads to your home.
On Twitter, existing relationships can be maintained, and new relationships are formed within these networks of constant communication that start with a simple "follow" relationship and naturally evolve over time. My interests lie primarily in technology and new media. Specifically, I follow people who are doing something with XQuery, NLP, Social Network Analysis, Music, and Vlogs. So sometimes these people participate in the same discussions because they move in the same circles for a certain topic area, and many times they don't. But I get to listen and participate in it all.
Imagine going to a party attended by all the people who you consider to be the coolest and most insightful for all the stuff you're interested in and you have the opportunity to talk to them all and/or hear them speak that night. Your interests are somewhat disparate, so these people are standing around having great discussions about the things you appreciate most, but they are also all maintaining their discussions in distinctly separate groups. You want to talk to them all, but during the course of the night, you will only have a chance to participate in 1 or 2 of the discussions at most. On Twitter, we're given the means to participate with everybody we're interested in and in all groups, and oh yeah, no time limit: the party never ends! Woo-Haa!
Twitter provides me with access to others of common interest and an opportunity to hear and be heard. It's a lot of fun, but also extremely useful.
How Twitter Helps Me Find Stuff
1) Twitter provides me with access to people who already have answers.
With Twitter I've been given access to communication networks of common interest. Yesterday I tweeted that I was looking for something. Before I even had a chance to Google it, a person with whom I'd formed a mutual "follow" relationship 2 days prior (around a shared interest in XQuery) replied with a solution immediately. Boom! Immediate answers!, not just a list of links to explore. (and the question/answer had nothing actually to do w/ XQuery.)
2) Twitter creates parallel Googling.
When I Google, I Google alone. Google's great, but Google to me is like the magic 8 ball of search. I enter a term, shake vigorously, and check out the first few pages of the 8 billion links returned in the window. If I don't find what I'm looking for, I change the question, shake again, repeat, etc. and hopefully at some point I finally find an answer I'm satisfied with. On Twitter, I'll have a number of people in my network Googling alongside me for the same resource, entering keywords based on their way of thinking as opposed to mine, and/or seeing things I may miss. Now I don't specifically ask people to Google. But if they have the same interests I do, chances are they're interested in finding the same info and may be looking for it already.
Usually people within a network search for the same things. So what I'm looking for or have found, someone else in my network is likely to look for in the future and/or has found an answer for already. So why even Google everything on the internet when my network will be looking for similar resources within a much smaller domain? An example:
Imagine we're all in the same history class, and the day's assignment is to write a certain essay on George Washington. When we go to do the homework that night, we'll all be looking for the same resources! So we can start with Google, which will give us results based on the keywords in our query, with no context or respect for the network we're in and what may have been searched/found for by us already, or we can tweet and see if anyone from class has already found some resources for us to start reviewing. If I find something, I can post the link on Twitter to be helpful, as I know others in my network from class (you, in this example) will be looking for it too. Maybe someone in the group did a report last year on a related topic, has some info to share, and tweets that. Or maybe someone's Dad just happens to be some sort of George Washington expert and tweets that! Twitter helps expose and take advantage of all that information.
With Twitter our search is augmented by the number of eyeballs, brains, and experiences attached to our follower/following network and people on Twitter tend to want to be helpful. People may have a direct link to us through a "follow"ing relationship, or they may just find us based on our previous tweets using a tool like summize.
3) Twitter helps me find stuff that isn't on the internet.
Google works great if what I'm looking for is on the internet, but on Twitter, through my network, I'm given help to find stuff in the real world that might not be indexed by a traditional search engine. Questions get answered and information gets shared about events and meet ups that occur in the real world for which there may be nothing to search for until someone blogs about it or reports on it after the fact. How about our George Washington expert above? Maybe there's nothing online about our friend's parent who can help us with our report, but Twitter just helped us find that person through a network of shared interest and common goal.
4) Twitter provides me with answers before I even figure out how to ask the question.
One of the qualities I find most valuable and appreciate the most about Twitter, is the IDKWIIBIKIWISI factor. (I don't know what it is, but I'll know it when I see it.)
How many of us spend time looking for that? I spend a lot, hence the name of the blog. But on Twitter, the information finds me, shared by people with similar interests through a simple tweet.
Twitter's just the utility for communication. Twitter doesn't have any logic to provide users with what they're looking for, but it enables people to fuel, view, and direct information so it gets to the people who have an interest in it. The networks that naturally form through "follow"ing expose me to conversations and resources I didn't even know existed, and/or wouldn't even know how to begin searching for. And its all just links, times, dates, addresses, and other resources people within a given interest group share through tweets as they find them. The end result is I get to learn more about the stuff I'm actually interested in, and I don't even have to go out and look for it, just start following and tweeting, and eventually someone finds me and/or shares.
Twitter 101
Twitter is a worldwide party that everyone's been invited to. Throughout the duration of the party, people come and go. While present, people contribute to conversations and the party in general in the form of mini blog posts called "tweets". You show up and can choose to walk around and enter/check-out the conversations at will. You can listen to what people have to say, or you can participate and give back by posting your own tweets.
You listen in by choosing to "follow" someone. People have the option of not letting you listen in, and can insure you/others won't ruin their existing conversations with inappropriate remarks by not following and/or "block"ing you. Likewise, if you follow someone and they turn out to be a jackass, or talk about things you don't really care about, you can choose to not follow them anymore as well. In this way you can control the endless stream of information that's generated in tweets by those in attendance and tailor the flow of communication to meet to your personal requirements/desires/etc.
Score-Double-Bonus-Action: You know when you go to a real party, and you're standing with a group of people having a great conversation, and some jackass keeps interrupting with something that's inappropriate, a downer, or just plain offensive? Well, imagine if you had a mute button for that person. Or how about when the conversation you were previously interested in has deteriorated to a point where you want to just walk away, but don't want to seem rude in doing so? Well, Twitter provides us with both options and both are acceptable behavior in Twitterville. Sweet!
I call them conversations, and sometimes they are. We can reply to each other on twitter and when we reply, its a direct reply to the original tweeter as well as a remark shared with those following the conversation. Others may choose to chime in with their own replies, either directly addressing a person, or just contributing to the conversation in general by tagging their comment with a #identifier. Many times though, a "conversation" is very one-sided; it's really a broadcast. (You always have people at the party who talk to show off and/or hear themselves speak, but don't really care or know how to listen to what others have to say.) After you've "follow"ed several people, you really end up using the follow/nofollow/block options to help harvest the large river of broadcasts you want to subscribe too/participate in.
Technology + People = Twitter
I won't say Twitter is simple technology. And simple does not mean easy. Digging a ditch is simple but not easy. You have a shovel, some dirt, you dig, simple right? Well, you're going to get calluses and blisters, the Sun's going to beat down on you, you'll hit rocks as you dig: Not easy stuff! So while Twitter's UI and communication mechanisms seem simple, we know there are some serious challenges too keeping the river of communication flowing, and major props go to the Twitter team there! The mechanisms provided by Twitter that enable people of shared interest to communicate with and find each other are just enough. The rest of the magic and awesomeness that is Twitter and the reason many find it so useful and valuable is really delivered through the people and their tweets.
People who tweet are usually bringing something to the party, in the form of sharing news, information, insights, links to blog posts, and/or other resources that we're all interested in (globally and locally). Some of that info has no other source than word of mouth, and Twitter gives people a real-time broadcast mechanism for information that might otherwise not be reported until later (or at all).
Back to our real party analogy: You know those people/friends who always show up to the party with something to share: beer/jokes/stories to tell/food, etc.? And then there are those who tend to always be the mooches? Well, I haven't found too many mooches on Twitter. Also, if there's a fire down the street, someone usually enters the party and says "did you know so-and-so's home is on fire?". You learn about it then and there and can take action if required, as opposed to learning about it the next day in the paper, online, etc. or when the fire eventually spreads to your home.
On Twitter, existing relationships can be maintained, and new relationships are formed within these networks of constant communication that start with a simple "follow" relationship and naturally evolve over time. My interests lie primarily in technology and new media. Specifically, I follow people who are doing something with XQuery, NLP, Social Network Analysis, Music, and Vlogs. So sometimes these people participate in the same discussions because they move in the same circles for a certain topic area, and many times they don't. But I get to listen and participate in it all.
Imagine going to a party attended by all the people who you consider to be the coolest and most insightful for all the stuff you're interested in and you have the opportunity to talk to them all and/or hear them speak that night. Your interests are somewhat disparate, so these people are standing around having great discussions about the things you appreciate most, but they are also all maintaining their discussions in distinctly separate groups. You want to talk to them all, but during the course of the night, you will only have a chance to participate in 1 or 2 of the discussions at most. On Twitter, we're given the means to participate with everybody we're interested in and in all groups, and oh yeah, no time limit: the party never ends! Woo-Haa!
Twitter provides me with access to others of common interest and an opportunity to hear and be heard. It's a lot of fun, but also extremely useful.
How Twitter Helps Me Find Stuff
1) Twitter provides me with access to people who already have answers.
With Twitter I've been given access to communication networks of common interest. Yesterday I tweeted that I was looking for something. Before I even had a chance to Google it, a person with whom I'd formed a mutual "follow" relationship 2 days prior (around a shared interest in XQuery) replied with a solution immediately. Boom! Immediate answers!, not just a list of links to explore. (and the question/answer had nothing actually to do w/ XQuery.)
2) Twitter creates parallel Googling.
When I Google, I Google alone. Google's great, but Google to me is like the magic 8 ball of search. I enter a term, shake vigorously, and check out the first few pages of the 8 billion links returned in the window. If I don't find what I'm looking for, I change the question, shake again, repeat, etc. and hopefully at some point I finally find an answer I'm satisfied with. On Twitter, I'll have a number of people in my network Googling alongside me for the same resource, entering keywords based on their way of thinking as opposed to mine, and/or seeing things I may miss. Now I don't specifically ask people to Google. But if they have the same interests I do, chances are they're interested in finding the same info and may be looking for it already.
Usually people within a network search for the same things. So what I'm looking for or have found, someone else in my network is likely to look for in the future and/or has found an answer for already. So why even Google everything on the internet when my network will be looking for similar resources within a much smaller domain? An example:
Imagine we're all in the same history class, and the day's assignment is to write a certain essay on George Washington. When we go to do the homework that night, we'll all be looking for the same resources! So we can start with Google, which will give us results based on the keywords in our query, with no context or respect for the network we're in and what may have been searched/found for by us already, or we can tweet and see if anyone from class has already found some resources for us to start reviewing. If I find something, I can post the link on Twitter to be helpful, as I know others in my network from class (you, in this example) will be looking for it too. Maybe someone in the group did a report last year on a related topic, has some info to share, and tweets that. Or maybe someone's Dad just happens to be some sort of George Washington expert and tweets that! Twitter helps expose and take advantage of all that information.
With Twitter our search is augmented by the number of eyeballs, brains, and experiences attached to our follower/following network and people on Twitter tend to want to be helpful. People may have a direct link to us through a "follow"ing relationship, or they may just find us based on our previous tweets using a tool like summize.
3) Twitter helps me find stuff that isn't on the internet.
Google works great if what I'm looking for is on the internet, but on Twitter, through my network, I'm given help to find stuff in the real world that might not be indexed by a traditional search engine. Questions get answered and information gets shared about events and meet ups that occur in the real world for which there may be nothing to search for until someone blogs about it or reports on it after the fact. How about our George Washington expert above? Maybe there's nothing online about our friend's parent who can help us with our report, but Twitter just helped us find that person through a network of shared interest and common goal.
4) Twitter provides me with answers before I even figure out how to ask the question.
One of the qualities I find most valuable and appreciate the most about Twitter, is the IDKWIIBIKIWISI factor. (I don't know what it is, but I'll know it when I see it.)
How many of us spend time looking for that? I spend a lot, hence the name of the blog. But on Twitter, the information finds me, shared by people with similar interests through a simple tweet.
Twitter's just the utility for communication. Twitter doesn't have any logic to provide users with what they're looking for, but it enables people to fuel, view, and direct information so it gets to the people who have an interest in it. The networks that naturally form through "follow"ing expose me to conversations and resources I didn't even know existed, and/or wouldn't even know how to begin searching for. And its all just links, times, dates, addresses, and other resources people within a given interest group share through tweets as they find them. The end result is I get to learn more about the stuff I'm actually interested in, and I don't even have to go out and look for it, just start following and tweeting, and eventually someone finds me and/or shares.
Sunday, March 1, 2009
Rocky Mountain News Final Edition
Part moving tribute, part documentary, this is 20 minutes i found fascinating. The people who report and make the paper happen are so dedicated , hard-working, intelligent, and sincere. The video really demonstrates the love and respect reporters have for their jobs and their readers, as well as the value a newspaper brings to a community. The vid also captures some valid insights comparing the value of reporters and papers to bloggers and the internets. Yet the newspaper absolutely refuses to change anything about its business model and that's shown here as well.
It's like watching people on a fast moving train headed for a collapsed tunnel. They know they're going to crash, but they think they're just passengers, so they keep doing what they do best (reporting), until the train finally crashes. Since papers refuse to change absolutely anything about themselves, it appears currently these people only have the choice of trying to find another doomed train to ride.
I'm rooting for a group to wake up, change the newspaper model, take the best of what this group offers, and succeed where EW Scripps fails so miserably.
See for yourself:
Final Edition from Matthew Roberts on Vimeo.
It's like watching people on a fast moving train headed for a collapsed tunnel. They know they're going to crash, but they think they're just passengers, so they keep doing what they do best (reporting), until the train finally crashes. Since papers refuse to change absolutely anything about themselves, it appears currently these people only have the choice of trying to find another doomed train to ride.
I'm rooting for a group to wake up, change the newspaper model, take the best of what this group offers, and succeed where EW Scripps fails so miserably.
See for yourself:
Final Edition from Matthew Roberts on Vimeo.
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