Notes from the @Twitter(verse): #news, #networking

I come in peace from the year 2008.

That's the year I remember Twitter developing into the cultural phenomenon it is today.  That's the first year I remember hearing "tweet" used not only as a verb ("I tweeted about it last night, yo") but as a verb used by "legitimate" forms of media (such as when a phrase such as "Barack Obama tweeted..." or "Sarah Palin made a statement on her Twitter account today..." appeared in The New York Times or The Washington Post).

I remember noting a dissonance between the conception of the internet I'd had then, which was probably more Web 1.0, and the conception of the web that was developing at that time with Web 2.0 as the expert/novice binary began to fracture.  Facebook allowed college and high school kids to speak to their friends and share photos, videos, and links.  I used it.  Twitter, it seemed, operated on what seemed simultaneously to be both a more personal and more global level:  the platform allowed college and high school kids to interact with presidential candidates, "following" their instant updates and, in some cases, being "followed" back by the campaign.

I remember feeling left out of that electoral conversation, yet reluctant to do anything about it. Sources such as the PEW Research Center mention that younger teens have been, and remain, more likely to use Facebook than Twitter.  For me, at least, that was true--although I can't say why.  I've always been a little bit of a news junkie, so it's not as though the political access Twitter affords didn't appeal to me when I'd previously considered creating an account.  It's also not as though none of my friends have Twitter accounts.  In all likelihood, I think I was resistant to Twitter because it was Twitter, and therefore representative of the new technology to which I continue to remain wary of being "tethered."  After all, barely a week goes by without the publication of a new report declaring the demise of person-to-person interaction.  I can't say those reports are entirely false:  often my college friends would pull out their phones and absently thumb through their new Twitter updates while we'd be watching a movie or hanging out over drinks.  I've caught myself participating in such activity, Twitter account or not, and hated myself for it.  The technical term for what could be termed an unhealthy attachment to one's cell phone is called "nomophobia," and I'd be surprised if I and my friends didn't all have it to some extent.  Last Monday I left my phone in my room from about 4 pm until 11 pm while I went from class to a running club meeting to a restaurant; I found myself worrying the entire time that someone would text me and not receive a response for hours, leading them to wonder where I was.  When I got home, the first thing I did was to check for messages.


Maybe I'm succumbing to being "wired."  Maybe being in a new place with few acquaintances has made it OK for me to spend my time with people (and, interestingly, organizations) who aren't physically in the same room as I am.  But, as in my last post, self-awareness is key--and I think a responsible use of Twitter has far more advantages than disadvantages.  Twitter is where news, and scandal, and, as in the case of the Arab Spring, revolution, often first erupt.  It's also where future colleagues of mine might be having conversations from which I'd be excluded without an account.  Maybe this means I'm joining to compensate for what will otherwise be a knowledge deficit; maybe I'm giving in to a cultural movement that weakens the kind of culture I prefer (which privileges the personal, not the virtual).  


But I'm trusting, again, in the power of self-awareness.  So, to make this more of a tinkering blog (and less of a personal grappling blog) let me tell you what I've achieved on Twitter.  I have a username, a picture, and a profile that is appropriately impersonal.  I have "followers" and people and organizations I "follow":  a sampling of these includes  Education Week, The Paris Review, The Nation, The New Yorker, and The Huffington Post.  I also follow The Met, NYC event organizations like TimeOut, the feed for the Olympics (London2012), etc.  On the technical, discourse-knowledge-specific side of things, I've figured out the "@" symbol and hashtagging (to a certain extent).  I know what "trends" are and where to find them; I know how to retweet a post and reply to one.  


Etc, etc.  I promised Jordyn my posts would be shorter, so here's the final paragraph:  I'm excited to see what I can do with Twitter in terms of maintaining a professional network.  I'm already getting great articles from Education Week; when I make friends who teach, I'll follow them for what will hopefully be content-specific tips and tricks and even conversations.  No one can predict whether Twitter will be around in two or five years from now, the internet being what it is--but if it is?  And if I manage, in that time, to cultivate a network of educators with whom I can trade ideas?  #awesome.  #righton.