BANNER FEB2010

Microblogging vs Blogging vs Talking

by Brian on June 18, 2009

in Blogs,Twitter

I need to interrupt all this Saved by the Bell Begins action to explain some tips (as I see them) about the All-New Internet. Some may think these are just pet peeves, but they’re more (as I see it) the best way to get your point/information across.

1) If you have a single thought that can be expressed in 140 characters or less, do it on Twitter. Don’t extend a simple, concise thought into 500 redundant words just so you can put it on your blog.

2) If you have a legit 500-word thought on something, go ahead and write that on your blog – don’t split it up into 20+ separate Tweets. Nobody reads the whole thing, and those same people aren’t glued to your profile page, and if they are, it’s still a pain to read it backward, or down-up, or however that would be. (You can always link to your blog post on your Twitter.)

3) If you want to have a pre-planned extended back and forth conversation with someone, do this on the phone or IM, or even go see them in person, and then try and make-out with them afterward. I saw someone conduct an interview over Twitter once, and it was really just like a big WTF. It came off as a miscalculated gimmick, and was impossible to follow, and the only way this can feasibly work is if you’re a petite brunette who’s under the age of 25, with a cutesy pop/rock singing voice.

You can’t do an interview via Twitter – it’s like punching someone in the wall of their house. (That’s like if you wanted to punch someone, and you punched the wall of their house, and expected it to hurt them on their body. That doesn’t equal anything – it’s an equation for sadness.)

That be all – back to jokes tomorrow.

(I’m right here on Twitter.)

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  • TVBrain
    'Member that time espn.com opened their comment feature up on a Bill Simmons column and the deadspin community went crazy on it? Some guy started pasting chapters of War & Peace into the comments.
    LOL.
  • .
  • Greg Odens tonsils
    What is this "twitter"?
  • I can dig it.
  • i totally agree and have been saying the same 3 things for months. glad you, as someone who has an online internet blog following, said it... and not just me saying it to my 3 friends.
  • I wanna be clear I'm not like bitching or something - I'd hope it's helpful.

    If someone is breaking a longform piece up into 50 short pieces that don't connect to one another, their message and intent will be lost and wasted. There are some who don't seem to realize it, and work by some "Twitter = success" baseline mantra.

    I'm saying this for the PEOPLE.
  • You got it right! I am always on twitter as I don't think I have that in me to write a 500 words post or something, twitter is way better!

    Amber
  • Points 1 and 2 I totally agree with, point 3 has many exceptions, to me twitter is all about conversations, admittedly mostly brief exchanges, but it occasionally seems appropriate to have a more extended one. And as for interviewing, depends what you're trying to accomplish. Twitter doesn't have rules, if the way people conduct themselves on twitter annoys you, just stop following them. I love all the social media bloggers making their pronouncements on what's appropriate or not on twitter (hey, I've done it myself!) like anything they say in that regard has any real validity. Great blog, love the analogy of hitting the house to hurt someone.
  • I agree that there really aren't rules at all - I get into extended back-and-forths quite a bit myself, and am all about the @. It's one thing for it to be organic, and another to set out to do it.

    I'd think as an interviewer wanting people to read their interview, it'd make more sense to not do it there - the format just doesn't lend itself to readability for that type of thing.

    And of course, any of this will be void within 6 months when it all changes again. :) Thanks for reading the post btw - appreciate that and the feedback.
  • "It came off as a miscalculated gimmick, and was impossible to follow" ..."the format just doesn't lend itself to readability for that type of thing."

    My thoughts exactly. Ever since I started observing Twitter and the way it makes it virtually impossible for you to properly track a "conversation", I thought to myself WTF??

    As a result, we developed Tweetboard. It reformats tweets into threaded conversations with unlimited nesting. You might want to check it out. (sample conversation: http://posted.at/UEw)

    Juan (founder)
  • LaTisha
    Hello My name is LaTisha and I like your brevity. I am uncertain about this from #3: "If you want to have a back and forth conversation with someone, do this on the phone or IM, or even go see them in person" Only because the entire of idea of Twitter is about shouting out into the ether about banal trivialities and suchness and the forth.

    BUT WHEN YOU INCLUDE "and then try and make-out with them afterward" ...well that makes perfect sense and should be something everyone aims/strives for. Then again ALL MEN DO strive for that. Let me recant...Only Super Hot Dudes should strive for that. And chicks should only strive for that if they are hot too and single. *I may need to revise this logic later, but luckily you have an ongoing blog full of a bunch of stuff and I can come back later*

    Great piece. I come from Boston. The same place they shot the movie "Soul Man" so my views may be a bit skewed on this particular matter, ya know, of which you speak. Regardless I say well done, bro.
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