In honor of a recent guest speaker to our Online Journalism class, social media strategist Alex de Carvalho, this week's posts (at least five of them) will be done as "Twitter" entries.
Twitter? What's that?
If that's what you're saying, don't worry. So was I until about two weeks ago.
For those of you new to "twittering," here's a simple definition of one of the newer forms of social media from - you guessed it - twitter.com: Twitter is a service for friends, family, and co–workers to communicate and stay connected through the exchange of quick, frequent answers to one simple question: What are you doing?
So there you have it. Twitter is simply another form of communication - among many - that allows people to stay connected. Beyond the simple friend-to-friend twittering, many news organizations are also jumping onboard the twitter bandwagon, if you will.
Some news media use twitter to tell people the ongoing events of a political rally. Others use it to give play-by-play highlights of press conferences. One Colorado newspaper has even twittered (and drawn considerable scrutiny for doing so) the events of a funeral service.
At this point you may be asking yourself how Twitter is any different than what we already have (as in updates of stories and web pages). Well, here's the answer: Twitter allows reporters to report news directly from the scene and at that very moment.
Oh, and one more thing: Twitter entries can be no more than 140 characters long. That's the point of Twitter. Quick and short updates of live events.
To illustrate the value and use of this new form of social media, I will be "twittering" updates from Friday night's Archbishop Carroll vs. LaSalle high school football game.
Check back tomorrow to follow along with the action...
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