SCHOOLING THE INTERNET'S OLD GUARD

So I sit on several list servers - old style twitter - email discussion lists.  Several are peopled by the old guard of the Internet - the once rebels now somewhat curmudgeon graying crowd (including me - '65 doesn't seem all that long ago but to my kids I'm a relic) - and we were talking about twitter.  

I penned a quick post in response to what the heck Twitter was all about -and thought I'd share it here (unedited for reasons that will become clear):

Both a Gen-X Boomer and lawyer.  Big twitter user here; I'm the reason Savage got involved at all and it took some tugging. ;-) 

Here's why it's cool (unedited, but I'm in a hurry and a pinched nerve in my neck is causing me excruciating pain, so apologies if this is more stream of consciousness than usual, but ... ):

1.  2-way; I follow a ton of people they follow back; the trick is in picking good filtering technology.

2.  Real time.  I mentor / work with law students who are all over it; they were tweeting live from the copyright hearings this week, so I was picking up all kinds of great information in real time, which any number of folks picked up on websites.

3.  You have to understand how to use hashtags.  it goes to filtering.

4.  It is mobile.

5.  It's legos for blogging - you find a billion apps out there; some are extremely useful.  Old style blogging is dying for the next generation; twitter is free flowing community / interactive blogging.  The web is a living thing; this is part of a more living dynamic.  If you want folks to read your blog - new folks let's say - they are on twitter.  They get to know you, they'll go over to read your blog.  Search engines are so, uh, 1990s.  Who wants to relate to a machine?  (just reflecting the twitter zeitgeist, so defenders of things old and true, "chilax" as my kids say; the Internet was once heresy; it's now old and mainstream; the new stuff is out on twitter.) 

6.  Websites are real estate; if you think people are hiring you b/c of your site, maybe; huge number of lawyers on twitter - interacting - relating marketing.  It's about relationship marketing.  There are simple ways to make money on twitter, but I don't bother with that; I am creating and deepening relationships with groups / people / areas I select.  (Twitter is also very targetable - you find people in your expertise, area, etc. follow them, they follow back, if you need to take conversation off line, you do - via Direct Message; from there you go to email or phone; it's very easy to tell you the truth).

7.  Tweetups - quasi random but typically organized around a community of interst - sort of, hey, I"m here, hanging out with a few folks talking about Web 3.0 --  come find me at xyz location.  

8.  fundraising / social awareness - already there have been amazing movements that have arisen almost overnight and gone worldwide and viral in a heartbeat.  Google is a search engine for static information.  TWitter is a realtime, dynamic search engine for people, events, relationship, broadcast, everything.  It's up to you to do with it what you will, which is entirely the point - it is what you make it.  20 somethings love that b/c you can; they don't like being told what to do; who did?

9.  News - incredible what I learn from twiter; I pretty much pass up news for twitter - I get better / faster information there - and I can research who is saying what by looking at their tweets 0- you can very quickly get an idea of a person's character from their tweets -- they are far less groomed than say a reporter's byline; from there I can go to traditional news sources, but on breaking issues twitter is out ahead by miles, and, say the copyright hearing - no one was covering that; people I knew were there tweeting, and reporting on who said what - it was incredibly informative.  go to twitter search and check it - #dmca1201  - I think the last hearing is today.  

10.  Twitter is web 3.0 b/t/w; 2.0 is over - that was facebook, but the interesting thing is twitter enhances facebook and vice versa  - it was because of enormous pressure from tweeting crowds that facebook backed down on its draconian implementations of content ownership - that went viral overnight - and was vastly stronger and more powerful than any traditional print media b/c who trusts traditional media anymore?  Sure, there's the NYT, and all that, but WSJ? when I was growing up that was a good publication; now it's a right wing rag.  why would I waste my time on that? 

Long story short, it is a tool.  It has advantages and disadvantages but to ignore it is to very much miss a giant move in the evolution of the Internet.  (And there's even Voice over Twitter; and hundreds of applications come out almost daily).  Again, I am not saying it is better or worse, just reflecting my experience with it.  Early on I was spending way too much time on it; I've since figured out what it is for me and how I use it; might spend 20 minutes every other day on it; sometimes more sometimes less; not a lot different than list serves.  

My recommendations?  Join, use tweetdeck as your interface; follow back; play nice and get to know people.  Twello is a good directory of who is out there.   Friendfeed is also a very nice interface that allows you to stitch your social web presence together, to the extent you find these newfangled kids things worth exploring.  

I'm easy to find: http://twitter.com/erikcecil; if you want some additional resoures / info on twitter, find me there and DM me; I'll send you what you need. 

P.S. if any of you are in Denver for Gluecon, look me up; I'll be there - and likely tweeting too as will most of that crowd.  

Zen Out!

E~

KUDOS TO PAUL BUDDE

I've always loved Aussies.  They fit into my theory of people from geographically huge countries.  Character seems to follow geography.  Open, expansive, welcoming.  It's been that way working with Paul on several projects and I'm thrilled to see his accomplishments recognized.  http://www.commsday.com/node/329

Broadcast->multicast->intercast->ecocast

Broadcast

The idea of media as broadcast took hold hundreds of years ago with the Gutenberg printing press. It's revolution was to spread the words of one to everyone. All of communications technology followed that same basic pattern for the next several hundred years. What made the press revolutionary was the concept of movable type. This was a significant improvement over previous methods of printing, which involved handwritten texts that took years to produce.

The late 19th and all of the 20th centuries are about the evolution of electronic media. It should come as no surprise that of the early modes of communication, broadcast radio and later broadcast was seen as a massive improvement on existing, mostly paper, systems of information distribution and exchange. It should also not be a surprise that the law was written along the same lines. Accordingly the sections of the 1934 Communications Act addressing broadcast television, broadcast radio, cable television and later satellite television, draw heavily on ideas centered around freedom of speech and related community standards for widely disseminated communication.

Multicast

The telephone (and telegraph), of course, also evolved at about the same time. Unlike broadcast, however, these technologies enable direct communication between individuals. Both the business and legal design follow principles of "common carriage", which is not much different than how a railroad or shipping company works. Basically it says I, customer, pay you, shipper, to ship my information between points. In return you, carrier, agree to carry it and not interfere with it.

Intercast 

The Internet never really fit into the broadcast or the common carriage model. Just as the printing press revolutionized the world with movable type, so too the Internet, and in particular, it's creation and use of another form of movable type - Internet Protocol - which not only allows different types of computer networks to intercommunicate, but also the creation of new forms of programming, and thus, new forms of communication, so too the Internet spans and exceeds the outside boundaries of previous forms of technology. As a result, the law has never really known what to do with it because neither a pure broadcast model nor a pure telecommunications model fit.

A while ago my local paper, the Rocky Mountain News, which I delivered by bicycle for many years as a newspaper delivery boy, shut down. This was a sad passing. At the same time, it shows that the Internet is not only the movable type but movable printing press for the masses. I would never imagined as a kid delivering that newspaper that some day I could sit in a room at home and instantly broadcast messages all across the planet or even update them from nearly anywhere. Faced with this, and with the massive information gathering power available to anyone who uses the Internet, one might think it impressive that traditional print media survived as long as it did.

More will change, and faster. The dissemination of information, ability to include intelligence in nearly any device and connect that device (and its intelligence) to any other, will continue to revolutionize all of civilization from its most basic infrastructure to how it organizes.

In the nearer term, the Internet will continue to profoundly affect all of how traditional telecommunications - telephone company, cable television company, and mobile telephone company - will evolve. As Brad Feld points out in his blog, the Internet and telecommunications "still" (I'd have to say appear) to exist in parallel universes. As intertwined as they may seem to those inside the traditional industry, they are not.  

Next step ..

Ecocast

Actually no "cast" at all; the entire system is alive, interacting, creating, interrelating; it's no longer an Internet really; it's so much more multidimensional as is communication; there's no "casting" - but rather constantly changing and responding in relation to & with an environment that is in constant flux.   Standing still and being silent is communication.  Think about it.   Or not.