Twitter

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British Library on Twitter
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Contents

Introduction

see also Survey of academic librarians attitudes towards Twitter and Libraries on Twitter

Twitter is a free microblogging tool that enables sharing of small bits of information with people in your network (think status updates on Facebook). Space is provided for members to share thoughts or answers to the question: "What am I doing?" Part of the lifestreaming or lifecasting trend on the web, twitterers post updates of all kinds despite how weighty or mundane the content of their posts. Twitter is a forum to share ideas, observations and useful (or pointless) information. Some people compare it to 'being telepathic' while others find it constitutes a kind of snooping or eavesdropping into what others are feeling, doing or talking about. See Twitter research bibliography (Danah Boyd) and Hubspot's State of the Twittosphere - 2009

Tweet copyrightability

An interesting discussion took place on Twitter recently about whether tweets are copyrightable. Read American legal view 'Tweet Copyrightability'. In Canada, I suspect that the concept of fair dealing governs the use of tweets. Where some of this gets interesting is if the idea represents intellectual property of the author or whether it is merely intended for communication purposes.

Citing tweets


See also Lee, Chelsea. (2009). How to Cite Twitter and Facebook, Part II: Reference List Entries and In-Text Citations. {blogpost} Retrieved from http://blog.apastyle.org/apastyle/social-media/

How widespread is Twitter?

According to the Twitter tracking tool, TwitDir - a Twitter Directory there are approximately ~ 5 million Twitter users as of October 2009. TwitDir is a cool site as you can browse the Twitterer users with the most followers and the busiest Twitter habits. Some anecdotal evidence suggests minimal use of Twitter in academia at this stage, though millenials in the United States have used Twitter extensively for the presidential campaign and to raise money for and track the activities of democratic nomineee Barack Obama.

How does it work?

You can begin to microblog on Twitter by setting up an account. Once you sign on you can find friends to follow and start posting. The premise is simple - just post based on the question "what are you doing"? The power is in content that is shared and the network you create. Your network is there for support. Questions are asked and answered, resources are sought and found, opinions are presented and modified. It's the best ongoing global discussion going!

Twitter search tools

Third-party clients

Twitter has inspired third-party clients and open source tools such as WittyTwitter, Twhirl, TinyTwitter (Windows Mobile) and http://m.twitter.com, which supports short messaging services (SMS) so you can send and receive Twitter messages with no client or user interface (UI). For hardcore fans, statistics sites are set up such as Twitterholic, Tweeterboard and Twaiku (Twitter Haiku's) and Twoosh when using exactly the maximum of 140 characters. The issue or phenomenon of digital presence in the 21st century is directly linked to sites like Twitter. Digital access to friends is important for twitterers as they can tweet each other, have surprise meet-ups, or talk about books (see Public Reading with DailyLit via Twitter).

plugins, applications, widgets

Twitter is social

Microblogging is an example of information technology's focus on sharing one's work and life and building a network of contacts, friends and 'followers'. Social media, including Twitter, are now promoting micro-posting as digital 'presence technology'. Twitter describes itself as "A global community of friends and strangers answering one simple question: What are you doing?" Users' posts on Twitter are amusingly called "tweets" and, its community of participants, referred to as the "twitosphere". High-profile participants form part of the twitterati. Posts that are regretted by participants are called "mistweets." Twitter includes a simple API (application-programming interface) that twitterers can use to create their own applications. For example, a mash-up with Google Maps called Twittervision shows users the geographical location of posters. If you want to update Twitter during one of its outages (too many tweets), check out Twiddict, which will accept posts from Twitter-users and queue them up until it is working again. Why update Twitter when its problems discourage users from using it? This is an important question for successful web 2.0 start-ups - where is your computer power? Speaking of start-ups, if Twitter is down you can search your posts at Twitter search.

Canadian context

A number of Canadian librarians use microblogging technologies such as Amy Buckland, Connie Crosby, Amanda Etches-Johnson, Darlene Fichter, Steve Matthews, Stephen Abrams and others. In 2008, I used Twitter as an information sharing tool in a health librarianship course at SLAIS with mixed results. For participating on Twitter, students were given bonus marks. However, uptake was poor. Some Canadian health librarians on Twitter include: Dean Giustini, Tim Tripp and Mary-Doug Wright. A few American health librarians Michelle Kraft, Rachel Walden, Meredith Solomon use Twitter.

UBC Librarians that Twitter

Here's a Twitter Directory of Librarians. At UBC Library, there are a number of librarian twitterers: Allan Cho, Katherine Miller, and others.

Canadian health librarians that Twitter

References

  1. 140 health care uses for Twitter.
  2. Giustini D, Wright MD. Twitter: an introduction to microblogging for health librarians.JCHLA/JABSC 30, 1, Winter 2009 http://pubs.nrc-cnrc.gc.ca/jchla/jchla1-09.html
  3. Is there such as thing as being fired for Twittering? CNET New.com
  4. Java A, Song X. Why we Twitter: understanding microblogging. 2007.
  5. 'Maple Leaf' Twitter: Why aren't more Canadian Librarians on Twitter? UBC Google scholar blog. December 31st, 2008
  6. Mischaud E. Twitter: Expressions of the Whole Self An investigation into user appropriation of a web-based communications platform. September 2007.
  7. "Of Canadian librarians and Twitter". MeldInMed blog, January 1st 2009
  8. On microblogging (with video)
  9. Social Guy blog. 100 Twitter Tools to Help You Achieve All Your Goals. Sociable Blog. March 18th, 2009.
  10. Top 20 Twitter Posts of 2008. Search Engine Journal. December 2008
  11. Twittering The Day Away - A Useful Tool for Librarians?
  12. What is microblogging?
  13. Wikipedia. Jaiku.
  14. Wikipedia. Micro-blogging.
  15. Wikipedia. Twitter.
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