Microblogging - Week 3

I think I like the idea of Twitter more than Twitter itself. As a microblogging site, I believe Twitter perfectly encompasses everything one could need from social media. It provides countless networking opportunities, messages of up to 140 characters can be directed to other people or be sent out to no-one in particular, and links to pictures or other websites can be shared simply.





The problem I have with Twitter is the two worlds which form the Twitter community; the professional users and the personal users. Professionals use Twitter to increase their industry knowledge while personal users post just about everything else...




Personally, I aim to keep my Twitter account for purely professional contacts. The majority of people I follow on Twitter are related to the LIS industry in some way. The idea of using my Twitter account for both personal and professional reasons is very unappealing to me. Because of the nature and popularity of Twitter, I find the high frequency of tweets to be somewhat overwhelming. By keeping my account professional I do not need to wade through ‘pointless’ personal messages to get to industry specific information. Some people suggest having a separate account for personal use, but I think other social media sites ie. Facebook, are better for personal connections.





I will continue to use Twitter beyond this unit, it is a great resource for industry information as well as networking. In my learning it will allow me to become more aware of what is happening in the LIS community both in Australia and internationally. I love Twitter for it’s ease of use and networking opportunities but I hate Twitter for blurring the lines between personal and professional worlds. Part of me wishes that Twitter was a site purely for professional connections, however the simple concept of Twitter (140 characters!!!) is so ingenious that I’ll just have to keep using it.


For further reading, Dianne Kollman has written a blog for The Huffington Post on the benefits of Twitter here.