"If a tech geek drinks ginger ale then puts it on Twitter why is this supposed to be interesting?"
This was in fact my last "Twitter". I knew we had something in common.
TAC should suggest a way to harness the energy involved in all that finger and thumb action. Maybe we could address our energy woes? Or does RSI affect the human digits, thus creating a medical crisis?
But--a distant possibility--might occasional nuggets of actual thought be buried in all that twittering and cellular babble? Nah! Let's just waste hours, weeks, months and years of mindless nothingness.
Never forget, employers, you are actually paying these people, and do you suppose they stop twittering during working hours? Just asking.
JJ:
Can't quantify it, but I bet the internet and mobile communication eat up at least 10% of US office worker productivity.
I agree with you about Twitter, I don't think it will ever get beyond the early adopter phase. But what is great to watch is how these early versions will evolve into something useful.
Twitter 1.0 is a big waste of time, but it opens the door so that Twitter (or whatever it's called) 5.0 will be something useful.
Bob,
I don't know if you're not a people person, but you just invoked Proust in rant about Twitter, which was more than redeeming.
If Proust were alive and on Twitter, I'd totally follow him. But, you know, not in a feckless way. I'd just like to see him write a sentence in under 140 characters. That'd be awesome. I would reply to him with snappy puns about using Twitter to go "in search of lost time," or alluding to our "remembrance of tweets past," and even though both puns refer to different translations of the same epic text, most of his followers wouldn't get it because they never actually read it like I did (a good chunk of it, anyway). Then he'd know how smart and funny I am and maybe, just maybe, he'd follow me.
OK, I see your point... There's no way that guy would use Twitter. Not if his stream-of-consciousness musings had to compete with what Robert Scoble and Steve Rubel had for breakfast, anyway.
P.S. I just Twittered this blog post. That is so meta.
Robert,
How do you Twitter a blog post?
Like this:
"How the Narcissistic Keep In Touch With the Feckless" http://tinyurl.com/66uw3v (Props to Brian Clark for introducing me to Bob Hoffman!)
Heheh, no Bob, how do you really feel? Honestly, I told you the first time I commented here that you were a horrid horrid influence....now I am possibly two clicks away from signing up for twitter .
Amy Derby says so far you are tweeting about your bladder...that is all kinds of existential funny.
Used to think exactly the same thing. And, in too many cases, you're right. However, I've found that I've followed people with interesting and/or funny shit to share. Twitter is very good for sharing links, relevant finds or a great line in a less time consuming way than an entire blog post. Particularly when paired with a desktop app like Twitteriffic. Yeah, there's some mundane stupidity that goes with it, but if you brutally "unfollow" the nit wits, Twitter can be a little like the impromptu round tables that take place at every good ad joint in the country every day. You learn something and have a laugh, too. It ain't all bad.
Just have to mention, I found your blog via twitter. Personally, I use it for breaking news and a chance to find hidden web gems such as this.
I just go to look at all the hot chick avatars.
http://tiny.cc/WhEuw
My apologies if you have heard of Flutter already. Flutter is for people who are too busy to Twitter.
I am with you on the Twitter bashing. It's a one-way dialogue where people simply talk about themselves unbeknownst to what others have to say in response. In fact, the only tweets I post are stories calling for the demise of Twitter.
What I find a tad bit hypocritical though is that you have a "follow TAC on Twitter" link next to your blog. A necessary evil, I supposed when you are a blogger, but the irony is rich. What is even more hypocritical is that I clicked it to follow you on Twitter. Ahh well...
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