My colleague Dan Kashman recently twitted the following tweet:
is the twitter follow a poor man’s personal intro? a la the linked-in request?
Which got me thinking:
Twitter is a great way to connect with someone that you might not be able to get a connection to on LinkedIn or in the real world. Getting on someones radar by hoping they reciprocate the follow (Don’t worry Dan, I am following you now too) can mean putting your message in front of that person.
Like any other social network the initial fanfare may die down a bit and people learn to block follow requests (e.g. Om Malik) which is smart considering the amount of spammers that are out there.
But to Dan’s original point Is Twitter becoming the next generation way to “ping” somebody that you exist or want to pitch?
Imagine if a VC firm decided that all their introductions and referrals now had to come through some sort of social network. Would this screen be helpful? Hurtful? Would it help weed out those not willing to read their submission form? Clearly this is an extreme example, but something similar might not be too far off.
I remember not too long ago I was reading about another way to do just that pitch someone on Del.icio.us . I thought this was a great idea at the time and still is.
So where is the communication all headed?
Well I agree with Nate in that blogging is still as strong as ever, and I recently stated my own opinion of the state of blogging.
I have been reading the man conversations happening around the blogosphere today, including the spark post from Jeremiah, and I have been thinking about some different ways of classifying all these conversations.
There are now three distinct categories of blogging in my opinion:
1. Blogging – consumed on a domain or via syndication but written in long form
(this is wordpress or typepad type of stuff)
2. Micro-Blogging – mini hits about thoughts, memes, your doings, or other short anecdotes in < 140 characters.
(this is Twitter or haiku)
3. Mini-Blogging - this is beyond text micro-blogging which can be text, pictures, quotes, links
(this is Pownce, Tumblr, etc...)
Therefore I believe there is a place for all three. Maybe there are more categories, but this post is not about the semantics of classification but rather the right place for each to live and get consumed. I think that micro-blogging and mini-blogging can lead to immediate dialogue. Maybe that dialogue will turn into a longer post on a persons blog. Perhaps that post will inspire someone to twitter how wrong the post is, then someone can look at both and analyze. This is just one example of something that is happening already.
Need a real world example?
Take the recent discussion about Enterprise Software – is it sexy debate. This started on the web with blogging, was mini and micro blogged, and continued on.
These are only my preliminary thoughts on this and will develop further. Reader thoughts welcome!
