God help me, I’m going to start Twittering. Dave Winer and Laura Fitton convinced me to take the leap, so it’s their fault. This all started because I spoke at Gnomdex. Here’s my Twitter info. Now you can see how boring my life is. :-)
Starting to Twitter
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About the Author: Guy Kawasaki
Guy Kawasaki is the chief evangelist of Canva, an online graphic design tool. Formerly, he was an advisor to the Motorola business unit of Google and chief evangelist of Apple. He is also the author of The Art of Social Media, The Art of the Start, APE: Author, Publisher, Entrepreneur, Enchantment, and nine other books. Kawasaki has a BA from Stanford University and an MBA from UCLA as well as an honorary doctorate from Babson College.
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LOL, Wow Guy, thanks. That’s some fine company to be in. I have to say props to you for listening to (reading) a no-name out of no-where with strong ideas about what Twitter could be to you. Your open mind is commendable. Welcome to Twitter.
I’ve been debating doing the same thing over the last little while. Think I’ll take the leap in the next couple of weeks after I move my blog to WordPress and can integrate the 2.
I’ve heard about this “twitter”…maybe I’ll do it too!
No, no, no!!! Guy, not you. Please not you.
I realize I’m being closed minded and I’ve tried not to, but I can’t get on board with Twitter. I’m still not convinced there will be real long-term business value of the technology (there is some perceived now, but we’ll see if that remains). But that isn’t what really matters.
More to the point…who really wants or needs to give OR get this level of minutiae, whether it’s by Twitter (or other), email, phone or in-person???
As a recent recipient of a signed copy of your book, I’d like to recommend that you give yappd.com a try. We’re still new to the micro-blogging scene, but we’re in the process of adding a bunch of new features, including an api, web-based image uploads, and twitter integration.
How about meaningful microblogging at Wow!We Are Observing!?
Let’s see, you picked up 196 followers in about 4 hours, about 0.8/minute. And at least 1 new twitter subscription was created as a result of your post (mine).
Quite a wake you are pulling behind.
You old fuddy duddy you!
Guy,
Can you tell me what is the point to use Twitter?
Is it worth it to broadcast your life?
Mario Ruiz
@ http://www.oursheet.com
Why Twitter, as opposed to Pownce or Jaiku?
I try not to let the bozo’s get me down and be open to all things but for the life of me don’t see business proposition for me and my lawyer clients using Twitter for networking.
When you figure it out guy, please blog it.
And yes, after Gnomedex I registered at Twitter.
I for one left Twitter for Pownce — and I am not looking back.
Guy, whether or not you will find it useful remains to be seen. I like to think of it as LinkedIn “live”. I’ve met an incredibly diverse group of smart, engaging people on Twitter. Since you added me, and Chris Brogan blogged about Twitter, suffice to say I’ve met quite a few more!
;-)
Look, Twitter certainly isn’t for everyone. But, clearly there are valuable business uses for Twitter. I’m glad you’ve joined and that you chose to add me.
Today I had two members of my staff in my office … truly young (23 each) alpha geeks. Super smart. Super wired.
One of them was telling me about a new application he was building for his blog. I said, “Oh, that sounds a lot like Twitter.”
In unison, they said, “What’s twitter?”
I was floored. They had no idea, even after I showed them.
The one guy explained why his app was different, and the other commented on the lameness of Twitter.
That didn’t stop me from IMing a colleague, “See, I’m cooler than these guys.”
Her response: “Or Twitter isn’t cool.”
I vote for Twitter isn’t cool. I’ve never really got the fascination with it.
I tried Twitter for a while but did not really enjoy it. I am going to give it another try at some point but I have to find some way that it is enjoyable for me.
Maybe professional networkers, idea-growers, and commentators can afford to spend this kind of time in Web 2.0 (blogging, social networking, RSS reading, delicious tagging, IMing, etc.) but for people who work in jobs where they are supposed to produce something other than ideas — it is just not possible to spend the kind of time needed to twitter, twattle, jangle, and jingle. Oh, right, and some of us have RL too.
As a marketing person, I have to know what all these things are, and I try many of them, mainly on my own time, I must add. I have doubts about the business productivity of people who are heavy users of these “tools”. What am I contributing to my company’s bottom line? What are we convincing ourselves is “work”? Even as the head marketing honcho/chica, how much am I really contributing to my company when I spend time on these “tools”.
At the begining, I was like many of other commenters here : what the heck this new app was going to bring us ? Why would people be interested in following the life of strangers, minute after minute ?… Of course, as a Web 2.0 observer, I subscribed to Twitter, sent a couple of messages, and gave up.
Until I thought out of the box. Twitter is a simple/easy to use/multi-platform/multi-terminal communication tool. Therefore, I can use it for business !
Today, Twitter is the key fundation of a beta product I’m developing, in between cell phones, Yahoo!Pipes, and GoogleMaps. Guess what : this product has nothing to do (at least directly) with the Web per se.
That is the Beauty of the Web 2.0 : all the basic bricks are there for you to build up any kind of software/web-based solution, in any kind of industry.
Great, so we’ll now find you there…see you then !
Why Twitter when there’s Jaiku?
hi there
just wanted to say that this is the best blog on the net
Consider creating a Jaiku account and feed it your Twitter feed so us Jaikuians can follow you too. No additionial work on your part other than creating the account and configuring it to receive your twitters.
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Roy,
I think I did this. Please let me know Guy@truemors.com. I put in my Twitter and Truemors feed.
Thanks!
Guy
Web 2.0 PersonalityTypes
Theres a Facebook application called Personal DNA that I came across recently. Its like a Myers Briggs personality test. When I took it, I found my personality was Encouraging Leader. Its a fortune cookie, but…
This is great news… now I can really follow you around :-) Ha, ha… I must confess though, you were the first person I tried to locate when I joined twitter a few weeks ago.
Best, Duncan Freeman
Welcome to the madhouse of Twitter! Enjoy the fun. :)
Twitter has been getting alot better lately. There’s search now! It’s super fun, you’ll like it.
http://twitter.com/ronin691
Twitter has been getting alot better lately! There’s search now. It’s totally fun Guy, you’ll like it.
http://twitter.com/ronin691
I tried, then I started to think WTF was I thinking using Twitter.
For me, I can live without it.
I twitter’d for awhile,
I gave it a shot.
But after a few weeks,
It just wasn’t my hot.
Maybe I ended it early,
Just not enough friends
to make it worth my time,
It just had to end.