Twitter and the Social Sixth Sense
I’ve noticed a recent slowdown in the blogs that I read. This is probably because most people go on vacations this time of year. I’m able to keep in touch with some people through twitter. Twitter let’s you publish micro blog posts via text messaging so there’s no reason not to publish updates about your life unless you want a complete retreat from technology and or what I like to call the “Socialnet”.
Why would I want to know what these people are doing anyway? I’m not completely sure but Clive Thompson might have the answer in his recent Wired article “How Twitter Creates a Social Sixth Sense”. Clive suggests that the accumulating micro posts develop “an almost telepathic awareness” of the people you are following. He also suggests that social networks like twitter “give a group of people a sense of itself, making possible weird, fascinating feats of coordination".
I’ve been using Twitter for several weeks now along with a group of my friends. The attraction to Twitter started out from a technological perspective. I wanted to build OSX and Vista widgets that would do some Web 2.0 “stuff”. Twitter was a trivial example. I completed the projects but the fascination with Twitter did not stop there. A handful of my friends began updating Twitter several times a day. I felt I owed them my status updates as well and soon became addicted to posting my status at daily sometimes hourly milestones.
Just the other day one of my friends was visiting from the West coast. I hadn’t planned on meeting up with him. I was away for a few days and figured he would be heading back West before I returned. Later in the week after I had returned home I received a Twitter update from him in the afternoon. It said he was on route 95 headed to Maine. This route passes right by my house so I responded with a message saying that we should meet up for a few drinks in Portsmouth.
I wouldn’t necessarily classify this as a fascinating feat of coordination but thanks to Twitter I was able to meet up with an old friend and introduce him to a legendary drink here in Portsmouth.
Why would I want to know what these people are doing anyway? I’m not completely sure but Clive Thompson might have the answer in his recent Wired article “How Twitter Creates a Social Sixth Sense”. Clive suggests that the accumulating micro posts develop “an almost telepathic awareness” of the people you are following. He also suggests that social networks like twitter “give a group of people a sense of itself, making possible weird, fascinating feats of coordination".
I’ve been using Twitter for several weeks now along with a group of my friends. The attraction to Twitter started out from a technological perspective. I wanted to build OSX and Vista widgets that would do some Web 2.0 “stuff”. Twitter was a trivial example. I completed the projects but the fascination with Twitter did not stop there. A handful of my friends began updating Twitter several times a day. I felt I owed them my status updates as well and soon became addicted to posting my status at daily sometimes hourly milestones.
Just the other day one of my friends was visiting from the West coast. I hadn’t planned on meeting up with him. I was away for a few days and figured he would be heading back West before I returned. Later in the week after I had returned home I received a Twitter update from him in the afternoon. It said he was on route 95 headed to Maine. This route passes right by my house so I responded with a message saying that we should meet up for a few drinks in Portsmouth.
I wouldn’t necessarily classify this as a fascinating feat of coordination but thanks to Twitter I was able to meet up with an old friend and introduce him to a legendary drink here in Portsmouth.
posted by m@ at 8:47 AM
1 Comments:
Twitter certainly presents us with an interesting social tool that goes beyond the browser, to the desktop and most often onto the phone vibrating in our pockets. Thanks for sharing it got me thinking.
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