As my foray into social media continues, I have created a Twitter account at the behest of my Research Methods professor @gHarsha <— see, I’m learning! My inital opinion on the microblogging site was, what is the point?? Isn’t it just the same as Facebook status update? And what was worse, none of my friends are on it. Why would I use this?
It wasn’t until said professor had us do an assignment where we were supposed to explore the reasons that Twitter could be the “next big thing” and what it would have to overcome to get there. After doing some seriously in depth research considering the topic, I started to see why people have embraced it.
Five ways in which Twitter could change our world:
1. It’s a way that people can connect to friends, neighbors, coworkers, people across the world, celebrities, ect.
2. Minute-by-minute updates useful for trend watching, emergency alerts and sporting events among other things. For example, social media has been more effective in alerting people about emergencies, like the Virginia Tech shooting, than the traditional university alert system. Some universities already have new alert systems incorporating social media.
3. Effective in mobilizing efforts and gathering eyewitness accounts during a disaster such as the attacks on Mumbai. People “tweeted” about what they saw, help lines and contact numbers for those who had friends involved in the attacks, as well as pleas for blood donors at specific hospitals that were low on supplies.
4. It can be used as an effective campaign tool. Whereas campaign emails get lost in inboxes and spam, tweets cut through the noise with a short and to-the-point message.
5. Users can receive the messages anywhere they are through a variety of outlets – text messages, instant messages and RSS news feeds.
Five hurdles to becoming the next big thing:
1. Twitter doesn’t generate revenue and exists on funding alone which limits its long-term viability. It will likely have to adopt an ad supported business model.
2. Some users complain about feeling “too connected.” Many users tweet all day about mundane things like what they are having for lunch or everyday annoyances making it hard to separate valuable content from the noise.
3. They have had a lot of security problems. Hacking the main system has compromised several high profile accounts.
4. Due to the exponential growth over a short time, Twitter has experienced several outages.
5. Rumor mill. Unsubstantiated rumors quickly snowball through tweets that are re-tweeted over and over again.
So after some time, I have conceded my previous stance on the triviality of Twitter and am not afraid to admit that I usually check Twitter before I log onto Facebook… in fact I’m starting to find myself thinking in 140 characters or less. Tweet me @egavette
