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Twitter is a social networking site founded in 2006 as a service to allow friends and co-workers to communicate and stay up to date with each other through the use of tweets. Tweets are 140 character length messages which answer the basic question, "what are you doing?". Users publish these tweets to their profile pages and everyone who has signed up to follow that particular user will receive the tweets as well. This micro-blogging framework has enabled news organizations, politicians and celebrities to interact with the community of users and provide real time updates in a way traditional media (newspapers, blogs, etc..) was never able to do.

Twitter
MSRP --
Release date March, 2006
Brand Twitter
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Pros & Cons20
Reviews11
Details
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Competitors2
Comments3
twitter

Pros & Cons

ProSCORE
10 reviews
62
negative
mixed
positive
5 positive
3 mixed
2 negative

[i] How is the ProSCORE calculated?

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Pros:
Do you agree?
Great for up to the minute news
+10agreedisagree

Awesome 3rd party applications
+9agreedisagree

Can interact with the service through many different devices
+9agreedisagree

Intriguing new method of communication
+8agreedisagree

Useful when used within a circle of friends
+8agreedisagree

#topic based tweets are useful for monitoring activity on a topic
+6agreedisagree

Follow celebrities directly
+3agreedisagree

Useful to ensure free speech
+3agreedisagree

Essentially you can ask the "Internet" a question and receive a response
+3agreedisagree

If you are careful with who you follow it can be very effective at keeping yourself informed in areas that interest you (business, local, news, industry, etc.)
+2agreedisagree

Trending topics / popular keywords is an interesting way to monitor Internet buzz
+2agreedisagree

Individuals can become celebrity-like, per the content they post
0agreedisagree

Cons:
Do you agree?
Used primarily for self-promotion services
+7agreedisagree

Inundated with a lot of spam posts and people
+7agreedisagree

The actual website twitter.com isn't that good
+5agreedisagree

If you're not a celebrity no one cares about you
+4agreedisagree

140 character restriction limits the amount of info users can include in their tweets
+3agreedisagree

Website goes down frequently
+1agreedisagree

can be difficult for ordinary individuals to develop a large enough following to make daily tweeting worthwhile
+1agreedisagree

unforgiving for typos, spelling and grammatical errors..can't correct them
+1agreedisagree


11 people added to this review by submitting or voting on pros and cons. Add your say!

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This report was started March 20, 2009 at 1:37 pm by Lefty10
with the last edit occurring July 23, 2009 at 8:49 am by Coop
This page has been viewed 1852 times, with 142 edits by 12 contributors.
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Competitors

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Comments

1.  avatar Omar said:

I go through an undulating love-hate relationship with Twitter. When I first heard about it I thought it was stupid frivolity. Then I saw some useful applications and joined up. Got connected with the local tech community but found that it was a lot of vacuous self-promotion (including myself). I quit it for about 6 months, and now it's become huge, and now the vacuous self-promotion is actually it's biggest use.

So, now I've come back to it and I find that it IS a lot more bustling, but it's fundamentally the same vacuous self-promotion, which makes it difficult to take too seriously.

Right now I see it as a necessary evil. I actually don't like it that much, but I need to be a player in the game. Gotta keep up with those digital Jones somehow.
Mar 20, 2009 4:34pm
2.  avatar emluca123 said:

I wish you could write more.
(Follow me, same user name, hehe)

Mar 21, 2009 2:06pm
3.  avatar Howlsthunder said:

I originally avoided Twitter for the same reasons Omar listed - it seemed like "vacuous self-promotion" in soundbytes and I personally prefer to have deep, meaningful communication.

But then two friends of mine got me to try Twitter. They see it as a place to put out spur-of-the-moment interesting or intelligently humerous thoughts that would otherwise not be welcome in, say, LiveJournal where we all post much more substantial thoughts. Not all people I know are capable of this so I don't follow those friends. ;) But its entertaining enough.

Not a month after I got Twitter I found its best use as a topic monitor for items of importance that I need to know ASAP. I live in Alaska and right now we have a volcano going off, spewing ash clouds that may or may not interfere with my day. The Alaska Volcano Observatory has a Twitter feed for volcano updates, complete with links to relevant websites showing fallout warnings and ash trajectories.

I think Twitter can be pretty hit or miss in terms of what people you follow, but I seem to of found a use for it and I rather like it for now.
Mar 31, 2009 12:56pm
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Reviews

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VesNL

avatar
April 30, 2009
approved
reviewer
ProSCORE
33
negative
mixed
positive
1 pro
2 cons

Pros

  • Great for up to the minute news

Cons

  • Used primarily for self-promotion services
  • Website goes down frequently

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