just an asterisk

Nearly everyone I’ve ever spoken with about Twitter has something negative to say.  “I don’t feel that self important”, “who cares what I’m doing now”, “what is so great about sharing the stupid little details of my life?” etc… I’ve even read some very funny critiques of the service (try this one for a laugh). 

Despite this noise, I’d like to propose that Twitter is occupying more of your mental bandwidth than you’d care to admit.  If you have a moment let’s take a look at some numbers and links to prove my case…

Check out the image below (thank you Google Insight).  It shows that in the US, we are coco for twitter puffs and that most of the world is hot in pursuit.  The darker the area on the map, the more Google searches have been performed for Twitter.

Moreover, the trend is increasing!  The graph below shows how we’ve steadily increased our searches for Twitter of the past two years.

So what’s my point?  Well maybe you should at least take a look at twitter!  Who knows?  You might find someone worth following or (gasp) be inspired to write your own.  JustanAsterisk in on twitter (but we’re not very good at it), so here are some alternatives to show you what’s going on:

1. seemonkea’s twitter – One of my favorite technology dudes, and a good friend, seemonkea (not his real name) tweets regularly with an interesting stream of sites, music links, and randomness.  It’s a great break from office life, his tweets are like the chocolate chips sans the cookie and other fluff.

2. Pogue’s twitter – If you’ve never read anything by New York Times columnist David Pogue, you’re missing out.  He writes about technology like we do, but with talent.  Check him out in your next newspaper AND take a peak at his prolific tweeting…

3. Lifehacker’s twitter – Like the blog but with a nervous tic, the lifehacker tweet spouts little factoids and tidbits many times per day.  It’s a great place for links but perhaps less entertaining than the two above.  However, if you’re looking for something new, it’s prime real estate.

There are tons more twitter users who are actually worth reading.  I recommend a simple test – take a favorite person and Google their name + twitter.  The results are often interesting.

Enjoy the new toy!

~ab

This entry was posted on Friday, June 19th, 2009 at 11:00 am and is filed under Web. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed.

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