Twittering gently
I was chatting to Mr Ribot about Twitter earlier today and he's asked me to post up a few thoughts, so here you go...
After a brief period of feeling slightly uncomfortable with the whole thing (in an "oh Christ, am I just participating in the latest web 2.0 circle-jerk" sense), I've decided that I really like it; and the reason for this is more to do with what it doesn't do than what it does.
I find Twitter to be absolutely fantastic for connecting me to a group of friends, without giving me permission to be interrupted by them. As such it reminds me very much of Matt Webb's work on glancing: for what's essentially a written medium, it seems decidedly non-verbal. There's already a social convention layered upon it to allow direct communication, outside of the private messaging that the service gives you), but there's no expectation that you're available or willing to chat, and I appreciate that.
So Twitterific has replaced Adium as my presence-agent-of-choice for the time being.
Mind you, those people who get twitters sent to their mobiles? That's just plain weird...