Twitter as Communication Device

So many people still don’t “get” Twitter because they don’t understand that Twitter is a two-way communications technology like email, instant messaging, and text messaging. In workshops about Twitter @befitt explicitly says that you need to stay active on Twitter for at least 3 months to decide whether or not it is working for you. I think this is a great idea. I think, however, sharing some of those “gems” of stories about how Twitter “works” are valid as well. This is such a story…
A couple of weeks before the end of the semester, I made plans with Shirley Rose, the Writing Program Administrator at Arizona State University, to meet with her for breakfast after the end of the semester. A week before we met, she emailed saying that she couldn’t make it unless we shuffled plans. We shuffled plans, which included me coming to pick her up before going to the restaurant. I got her address and phone number; we were ready to go!
Neither or us remembered to confirm our plans the day before our scheduled meeting. Before I left the house to go pick her up, I tweeted:

After we had settled at our table, Shirley asked me about my uses of Twitter. I briefly mentioned how both Twitter and Facebook are still very much “work” for me (I have not embraced them as much for the personal social connections) and I told her about how I like to use Twitter at conferences. We talked about back channeling (link to article in Chronicle/Inside Higher Ed) and various ways to incorporate the back channeling into presentations in productive ways. She then mentioned why she asked.
Like me, Shirley had realized we hadn’t confirmed and also realized she didn’t have my phone number. She went back to our email communications and noticed I had a link out to my Twitter account in the signature of the email. She linked out to my Twitter page, so my tweet (above), and knew I was on the way.
When I got home, I realized I had made a mistake in not checking my Twitter feed when I was with Shirley. I know I have followers who know “the WPA at ASU.” Two individuals had replied to me via Twitter, telling me to “say ‘hi’ to Shirley.” I then had to forward those well wishes on to Shirley in an email after the fact.

What I like about this story is that it not only shows that the power of Twitter is in two-way communication; but, that Twitter, like any other communications technology is not an independent tool. The conversations that emerge within social networking weave there way across synchronous and asynchronous as well as digital, analog, and real environments. To conclude, when folks (at this point it is usually small business owners and/or the students services folks in our colleges) ask me about whether they should do Facebook or Twitter, or which one to do first, I have to acknowledge that any environment they choose not to engage is a space where they’ll miss either parts of or entire conversations.

December 28 2009 | Posted in New Tech