"I don't get Twitter," my niece said to me over Christmas. "I signed up for an account and I'm following you, but I don't get it."
My sister-in-law wondered if Twitter "was really worth the time spent on it."
So there I was at Christmastime, explaining to my relatives why I spend time on Twitter.
I joined Twitter about nine months ago and I too, didn't "get it" at first. The 140-character conversations seemed like endless chatter that often didn't make any sense. I would log on the web version and try to follow the bits and pieces that showed up in my timeline. I quickly learned to follow a few friends and watch what they did, who they responded to and who they followed.
I slowly began sending out my own tweets and sharing links. Before I knew it, I had a community and even certain people that I chatted with on a regular basis. I discovered that Twitter was like a virtual watercooler for me--something that I didn't have access to on a face-to-face basis. Twitter was a neat, accessible, conversation machine that I could fully participate in.
"Don't try to follow it all," was the advice I learned time and time again. To me, Twitter is like a huge party. When I arrive, I feel out the conversations and move around from group to group. I join in the ones that interest me and offer conversations of my own.
A couple of months ago, I was looking for new songs to download and I turned to Twitter. Before long, I had a list of new love songs to try out and my post ended up on Google for "Twitter + love songs." It was fun to see the songs that people selected:
Twitter Love Songs
I've learned to use Twitter Search, Summize and TweetDeck to manage the tweets and find the topics that I'm interested in following as well as new people to follow. Darren Rowse from Problogger now has another website featuring Twitter Tips. From his site, I learned about Twellowhood, a site that let's you find people who Twitter from cities and states in the U.S. and Canada. Over at Liz Strauss's blog, she gives out some tips on how to get noticed on Twitter.
The folks from Disaboom are on Twitter as well as a few other Disaboom members too. Using the search tools, I've been able to find and connect with other people with disabilities over on Twitter. I'm @DeafMom over at Twitter.
If you're on Twitter and interested in sharing your tweets, leave your Twitter name/link in the comments below.
Happy Twittering!
