Thanks to my success with Twittercize, I was asked to guest lecture for a graduate Internet Marketing Communication class at the University of Denver. For one week, the online students obliged my rambling, opinionated self. This series of blog posts excerpts some of my answers. Special thanks to a real marketing whiz, Lora Louise Broady, for asking me to participate. You know I loves the spotlight.
For the average user, the old Facebook was like a pot-luck dinner party where you invite the guests. You can eat as much of your favorite foods as you want and typically avoid that strange olive-and-oranges salad the new guy from work brought to the party. Twitter (and the new Twitteresque Facebook) are meant to operate like a free all-you-can-eat buffet. You’re shoveling it in as fast as you can simply because everyone else seems to be doing the same.
From blog aggregators to satellite television, we’re all feeling a little nauseous from too much information. Worst of all, with Web 2.0, we’re compelled to over-consume because it’s free (at least on the surface). The end result: I saw three blog posts today about Twitter Fatigue, the phenomena of folks opting out for something a little more appetizing and a little less filling.
Most Web 3.0 talk centers on this issue–how to pour yourself a glass of exactly what you want by holding your hand in the digital equivalent of Niagara Falls. More importantly, the next generation of the web wants to help you find what you want when you don’t even know you want it. And, of course, in the process, make the developer wealthy enough to buy his own island.
For now, however, the key is to learn the art of opting-out. And go outside and stare at trees.
Regarding Twittercize, it’s an odd project. By sheer luck, I was one of the first service-based Twitter feeds and gained a lot of attention for it. Former NY Times journalist Craig Stoltz said he thinks Twittercize (and service-based tweets like it) may be a lasting purpose for Twitter–and to support that, the federal government recently started researching the possibility of using it as a digital Emergency Response System for disasters, etc.
Twittercize has achieved its purpose. I didn’t expect the project to last beyond January (when the New Year’s resolutions wore off) but I still gain around 100 followers every week. Yes, I think most people who follow do not do the exercises–my tweets are lost in the stream. But many people send me messages, every single day, to tell me they did.
Oh, and yes, I think most Twitter users are solipsistic and obsessed with amassing more followers. That’s okay. In the words of trip-hop artist Tricky, “everybody wants to be naked and famous.”
