To Twitter or not to Twitter, that is the question. Let me tell you why I think WE should.
Obama Tweets
In addition to my work in public relations for sustainable energy, I also work in the nonprofit information technology sector. I saw how Internet applications enabled the emergence of the Netroots – the diaspora of progressives across the country – as a political force that in part served as the foundation for the Obama campaign and its success.
Through work, I toiled on the periphery of the 2008 presidential campaign and was blown away by the way in which the Obama universe networked with one another using Twitter. Through 140 character missives sent/received from their PDAs or computers, information about what people were doing flowed through networks with lightning speed.
It wound up being the fundamental source for my information needs to pursue my 2008 work agenda and follow the growing Obama campaign. For example:
- Rather than peruse blogs, I followed twitter to find out what the trusted sources in my network were reading. For example, if Katrin Verclas – the queen of mobile applications for political campaigns and nonprofits – tweeted about a great article that she was reading, I would read it. And then others and I would dialogue (Tweet) about it with her.
- If I needed a suggestion for an online application, I could tweet my network, and people would shoot me back suggestions, and comment about the pros and cons of each others’ suggestions – all in realtime.
- If I was waffling about going to a conference but then read a tweet by Micah Sifry, editor of TechPresident, that he planned to attend, I would go.
- If I was at a conference, I could follow tweets of people at the same conference to find out how a press conference they were attending was going or where they were going for dinner.
It was like that Verizon commercial where you have the intelligence of your network at your fingertips 24/7.
Watching the presidential debates became this online/offline hybrid experience, where I could follow people in my Twitter network like NPR’s Andy Carvin to get their insightful comments, or ask them questions – once again in real time.
Imagining a Twittered Sustainable Sector
Then the campaign ended and now my business is firmly planted in the sustainable sector. I love it here but I miss the communications glue that bound me together with the nonprofit IT world. Imagine:
- How great it would be if you could tweet, “Looking for a product that can perform better than X. Any suggestions?” And your network would shoot you back their suggestions.
- Being able to follow what your gurus in the industry or reading or writing about or what they’re working on, or maybe the problems that they’re having.
- Getting Tweets from people with updates from a conference that you weren’t able to attend or requesting that they ask a speaker a question for you?
- Being out of town on business in New Haven and shooting out to your network that you’re headed to Louis for a burger so others could join you.
It is a phenomenal way to broaden your network that turns two-way communications (i.e., “Dan, do you know any good solar installers?) into a community way of communication (i.e, Community, do you know any solar installers?).
Not Another Time Suck
I know what you’re thinking. “Like I have time for this. I’m swamped already.” Twitter actually saved me time because I was constantly able to skim the cream off the top of my network rather than wallow in the swamps trying to eke out intelligence on my own. Plus, there’s no law that says you have to spend hours crafting 140 character witticisms. You can simply check out other people’s posts and when you think you have something to say, dive in.
Let’s Twitter
Personally, I’ve been looking for people to Twitter with in the sustainable field. So, if you’re on Twitter, please post your Twitter name in the comment section below. That way we can all start following one another.
To see how a community of Providence Geeks (yes, that’s their name) did this, check out: http://tinyurl.com/dgrd9m
If you don’t have a Twitter account, it will only take you a minute to set it up at http://www.twitter.com
By the way, on Twitter, I’m @Jo_Lee (Since this post, I’ve changed my user name to GreenMachinePR)
At the end of the day, I believe that truly deliberative communication takes place face-to-face. I’m still old fashioned that way. But, online applications, like Twitter, can facilitate that interaction and fill in the holes until we finally meet for that beer or coffee.
Looking forward tweeting with you soon!
Jo Lee
Jo,
Fabulous…
add me @michgonzalez I realize you want to get the NESEARI community on board and this article is compelling, because yes it does seem a waste of time, but pick the communities of interest for you. Also, realize that tweets do refer back to websites etc. There are also a ton of apps or software for the phone and your computer so you don’t have to go to the twitter page:
http://twril.com
Http://tweetdeck.com
http://www.twhirl.org/
I am still trying to get Robert to go to his profile on ning
Thanks for the nudge!!
Don’t twit, don’t text and if it can be said in less than 140 characters, its probably not worth saying.
“The faster solutions become, the greater the loss in our ability and patience to solve complex problems.” (210 chars)
Hi Jo:
I’m giving it a try!
i am vitanightfire, let’s twit, I mean tweet
Chris Benedict
Don’t birds tweet??
The term tweet, and words and expressions starting with tweet, may refer to:
* An onomatopoeia for bird song
o A small bird (childish, also “tweetybird”)
* A high-frequency sound from a loudspeaker or tweeter
* T-37 Tweet trainer and A-37 Dragonfly light-attack aircraft (the latter aka Super Tweet), from a high-pitched component in its engine noise
* A micro-blog post on the Twitter social network site
* Tweetie Pie, a 1947 Academy Award-winning animated short
* Tweety, a fictional character in various animated cartoons
* Tweet (singer) (born 1971), American R&B and soul singer-songwriter
* Tweety González (born 1963), Argentine musician
I vote for tweetybird… I tink I saw a putty cat…
How sad that communication by one-to-one dialogue, phone conversations, and hand-written thoughtful and well-crafted letters have degenerated first into tossed off emails and now into 140 characterless snippets of thought.
What a testament to the degredation of human society that few people seem to leave their homes – even for a walk in “nature” – without something electronic plugged in to their mind.
And how terribly revealing it is that people who consider themselves part of a movement toward “sustainability” are so willing to reduce human interaction to sound bytes.
If the best that can be said about Twitter is that it helped elect Obama – well, we’ve already seen what that’s got us: a colorful, articulate imperialist whose Twittering fooled nearly the entire “progressive” population of the U.S. into believing they were electing an honest advocate of change.
The tools that are truly green, are those that can be fabricated, understood, and repaired at home or close by, that allow a more natural pace of life and authentic human connection in real space and real time and an unmediated relationship with the web of life.
kin me spek n ful sentncs as edurctd dudes do?
Right now I have enough problems with getting adults to express themselves in full sentences (thank heaven we have a President who finally does) so why do we want to revert to Bush speak? Some of the e-mails without full sentences or full thoughts waste everyone’s time. I want people who can communicate well and I do not think “tweeting” can do it. Who is going to be able to pay my social security if you folks can’t even earn a living by being understood?
Best,
Joel N. Gordes
Cadet Geezer, 1st Class
Hey Joel – it was the Obama campaign not the Bush campaign that mobilized supporters using Twitter. In fact, they announced Biden as their VP pick on Twitter. I still follow Obama on Twitter.
I think it’s important to remember that different modes of communication are used for different purposes.
– Twitter is used for culling quick bits of information from your network on an as needed basis.
– Email is for one-on-one communication.
– Blogs are for communicating thoughts/ideas informally.
– Articles are more in-depth formal pieces.
– Real-time, real-life communication is where the most productive deliberation takes place.
It’s hard for me to imagine in today’s world, reliance solely on one of the above to achieve our varied communications needs.
Bravo to post #5.
To Jo Lee… it is important to remember that most things fail not by falling off a cliff, but by slowly slipping down a slope whose pitch may not even be perceptible ….
As an FYI, I was in I.T. for 30+ years versed in everything from programming to network creation from the ground up. I have seen computers go from punch cards to where they are today, an interesting journey to say the least. I mention this only to put fourth that I am by no means a technophobic… quite the opposite. Technology is the only way for man to go the long haul. Insurmountable amounts of it are required to stay off global impacts. The problem is as always, the unintended consequences caused by man and his short sightedness using the technology, which largely rests in our failed socio-political systems and perhaps in simply the “way we are wired”, DNA wise. And yes I know this was a Twitter post, but like the twitter it really ends up being connected to everything, eventually.
This comic says it all as far as I am concerned. (sorry I don’t know how to attach pictures to comments here)
http://www.slowpokecomics.com/strips/virtualvortex.html
LOL…that’s cute… and allot of truth…
For those of you who are interested in exploring Twitter further, here are some apps you can check out to improve your Twitter experience:
Seesmic Desktop
Co-Tweet
Twibes
TweetDeck
Nambu (Mac only)
TweetSpinner
Thanks Susan Korte of “What Grows on in RI Calendar” and “The Providential Gardener” for a link to a great article on Twitter which emphasizes the application’s relevance as a blogging (micro-blogging) format. “Look at Twitter as a blog” http://is.gd/Cpna
If you like blogs, you just might want to give Twitter a second look.
Jo Lee has offered us a perfect demonstration of the atrophy of human intellectual ability consequent to a dependence upon oversimplified high-frequency verbal exchange.
Joel N. Gordes proffered the question: “why do we want to revert to Bush speak (which he ellaborated as the inability to speak in complete sentences)?
Jo Lee, apparently unable to comprehend the meaning of Joel’s words (perhaps because they constituted an entire paragraph of full and grammatical sentences), imputed to him a statement he did not make – that Bush introduced political Twittering – and refuted that.
When the communicate at high speeds in short bursts of language with minimal depth, we also lose our ability to comprehend meaningful and well-articulated language because we cannot devote the few additional moments of time required to absorb it and because our minds lose the ability to comprehend contextualized meaning.
While FCFCFC (post #9) seems to agree with my concerns (in post #5), his perspective is nearly 180° contrary to mine.
He states: “Technology is the only way for man to go the long haul…The problem is as always, the unintended consequences caused by man and his short sightedness using the technology…”
As a salesman of technology (wearesolar.com), he fails to appreciate that unintended consequences are inherent in the technology itself, as well as by the technological mindset that can see “solutions” to technological problems only in more and “better” technology. Read Marshall McLuhan (“the medium is the message”) or Jerry Mander (Four Arguments for the Elimination of Television) to understand this.
But FCFCFC, in an apparent Freudian slip, revealed the limitations of the technological approach by saying: “Insurmountable amounts of it are required to stay off global impacts.” This is a perfect statement of the hamster wheel effect: the more problems created by technology, the more and more complex technology required to “fix” it. That mindset creates “insurmountable” obstacles to sustainability.
I, too, started programming computers with punch cards, and participated in the evolution to work stations, PCs and laptops – and ironically entered cyberspace (internet) to help prevent the Y2K catastrophe built into the architecture of our global technology.
But the only authentic solution to the problems engendered by runaway technology is to re-invent or re-discover human-scale and locally-appropriate tools. If we wish to communicate outside the limitations of time and place, then we should re-learn the once-common art of mental telepathy – a skill that will forever atrophy if we continue to rely on machines as crutches to hide our self-inflicted disabilities.
From above… post #2
“The faster solutions become, the greater the loss in our ability and patience to solve complex problems.”
In fairness to JL, you have to look at the business she is involved in… PR.. come on.. she has to, whether she likes it or not (I make no judgment here), keep up with the competition and in that business its all about the current and coming “buzz” x 10.
I do not offer this as an excuse or license to sound bite those things that should otherwise be global obsessions in mental challenges and preemptive actions, but she has to make a living, like all of us, through no fault or complicity of her own. We were born into a monetary world and unless you are super-human, you kind of have to go with the flow sometimes, at least to be able to survive in the most basic sense…. and I am sure she has a knack and is very good at what she does
…..Bill
..oh and BTW… I am sure she just misread the other post.. I know I and the rest of the human race are guilty of such things now and then… yes, Robert…
I love the Internet because though much of the communication is informal and short in nature, it is unrivaled in its ability to inspire dialogue and debate.
In response to a number of the above comments, I offer the following:
1. I’m afraid an earlier commenter misread my comment regarding Bush and Twitter. My point was that the Obama campaign saw Twitter as an appropriate communications medium for one of our most articulate presidential candidates. They realized the potential of Twitter – unlike the Bush administration that rejected inclusiveness – to broaden the reach of the campaign.
Like all forms of communication, Twitter worked for the campaign because at its basis was a message of substance. Twitter will work as a community organizing mode of communication for NESEA, because at its basis is a community of substance. If that element was lacking, I would never recommend Twitter.
2. Regarding PR, like all professions, PR can be abused. No more or no less than any other – lawyers, medical professionals, contractors…
To fully understand how we arrived at the financial and culturally crippled place that we as a society inhabit today, requires a much more nuanced analysis than simply blaming PR for all of our ills.
Public relations can be an incredibly valuable tool for organizations, associations, or any other organized entity to get their message out beyond the echo chamber to a broader public. PR has been effectively used to promote greater awareness about issues such as climate change, the growing significance of alternative energy, the need to green existing building stock…
Granted, the intention behind messaging can have a negative or positive effect on society. But that issue is completely divorced from the value of PR in and of itself.
I invite all of you to respond to this comment. However, I encourage all of you to present your ideas in a respectful and professional manner. By doing so, you will not be diminishing the impact of your ideas but rather helping to cultivate an environment that many will feel comfortable contributing to. Thx, Jo
It is interesting to note that Jo’s post about Twitter has now garnered more participation than all the previous posts here at the NESEA Blog regarding issues more specifically oriented to the work of the professional communities NESEA primarily serves.
I am not sure what this means except perhaps Marshall McLuhan was right and “the medium is the message”.
PR responsible for the worlds ill’s??? That’s incredibly funny and brings to mind the possibility of a great SNL skit!! LOL..LOL..LOL.. … My GOD my mind is flooding with scenes, costumes, cast and dialog.. it would be great… If the above PR comment was headed in my direction and offered in seriousness, well I just won’t comment… thank you for the Saturday laugh though..
The 18th century pragmatic philosophers like Kant, Pierce, etc. would go one step further and possibly say, “I am a language”.
So, I thought I’d give it a try…
Twitter is over capacity.
Too many tweets! Please wait a moment and try again.
now what
one of the problems with blogs and twits is that contributors/commenters have no feedback mechanism, as to current activity, unless a twitterer uses RSS or other, without maintaining a constant online presence, which i’m probably not going to do, full time, and especially, because its not working for me now.
Also, nobody’s going to read this unless they tweak their twitter thing to act like an email list and set it up so as to be sent every entry as it is entered, or digested daily or whatever later.
Hi Ross: Thanks for giving it a shot. Like all new apps, Twitter is buggy. No doubt about it and sorry you had to experience this your first time out. You bring up a good point about receiving updates via email. There might be a program out there that does that. I’ll look into it and report back if I find anything.
Personally, I use Twhirl – an app that runs on my computer and alerts me when new posts are up from people that I follow. It’s easy to use and not particularly intrusive, especially if you set it to only follow those people whose comments you really care about.
A number of people use Twitter’s Iphone apps, or simply have their cell phones, PDAs set to alert them when there are new comments, once again from people that they follow.
Thank you for taking the effort to check this out.
I should reiterate, it only makes sense if there is a community on Twitter that you want to communicate with.
If a number of people from NESEA did this, we could start growing this community. Or you might find others on there already in the green building sector. The point of this post was not to fetishize technology but to show how a community can utilize to communicate more efficiently.
Thanks!
Jo
I didn’t know you had posted a message. This is a problem. And it appears to be a problem with basecamp, also, except I did sign up for RSS alerts so I can be emailed whenever something is posted, except it may be that a poster or commenter only gets feedback or a notice that something has been added to that topic when something is added to a particular topic – this is a mess – who’s idea was it to go to Basecamp anyway? – its was clearly not a group decision. Anyway… Re: Twitter, I looked at it again, because you advocated using it and you are JO LEE and you’re on the Board and I’m interested in media and I’m trying to get plugged in, so I’m willing to try to follow the leader. But, I don’t get it. You advocate using twitter, but don’t use it yourself? I guess there’s no there there, at least not at this time.
Well, yes they definitely need the comment count displayed at higher levels than when you are in the comments.
I wish people would put all this “communication methodology worry” energy into truth and un-corrupting our processes. WE might actually have a country that functions on truth and good engineering instead of lies and corrupt money…. Tweet…
It took me a while but I’m finally on! @AltE_Jay
For those interested in how some building science professionals are making effective use of twitter, you might take a look at my recent post “A Few of our Favorite Certified Energy Auditors on Twitter” where I’ve identified some of the more active participants.
http://www.energycircle.com/blog/2009/07/01/a-few-of-our-favorite-certified-energy-auditors-on-twitter/