Twitter is not a new product, it has been around for a few years. But people now see it mentioned close to 24/7. The folks we watch on MSNBC use it. Our elected leaders use it. Heck a lot of "famous" people are using it.
But I really wonder if folks get what it is.
As a tech geek I don't mind when other folks find out what I've known about for a long time. But I do get frustrated when people don't understand the purpose of the technology and savage it.
The concept behind Twitter is stupid simple.
Now before I get to the concept of Twitter it is important to know where it came from. Evan Williams is the man behind it. Evan is famous, at least in tech circles, cause he founded and later sold Blogger to Google. Maybe more than any one person he made "blogging" popular.
He and his team were working on a podcast site, Odeo, before there was iTunes, and the idea came to one of his developers. They were sending a lot of SMS (Short Message Service) messages and wondered why their wasn't an Internet based service that did the same thing.
So they launched Twitter. A service where any message you send is limited to 140 characters. You can choose what people you want to "follow," which means you get their Tweets.
I hear a lot of folks slam the service. That the only folks that use it are full of themselves. It is a vanity thing.
Well actually at some level that is correct. If you don't care that somebody you are following just got a new CD, bought a cup of coffee, or is about to hop in the shower, then don't follow them. That is the point of the service.
It is simple, short messages meant to highlight what you are doing. Again, that is the concept behind the darn thing.
I follow folks that work in my industry. So maybe I can't attend SXSW, but I can follow people that are there. I don't talk to my brother on a daily basis (maybe I should) but I know what he is doing. I feel connected to him.
That is what the service is about.