May 12th, 2008
Twitter is instant messaging inside out
This weekend I was talking to some friends about Twitter (yes, the bad parts as much as the good) and the question came up "So what is different about that than instant messaging"? It was a good question, so the following is my answer.
Twitter is instant messaging inside out.
When using Instant Messaging (or chat) you choose who you want to talk to. You have a list of defined friends, and when you want to say something, you click on one or more names and type away. The content of that conversation is just between you and the selected people. No one else can benefit from it. That can be both good and bad.
With Twitter, instead you choose who you want to listen to. When you "tweet" (type in 140 characters or less) it is broadcast to everyone on Twitter. Information is not limited to just a specific group. Of course with millions of users, the full stream of information is impossible for anyone to read, so you filter the tweets you want to read down to just the people you care about, by "following" them. Still, even then conversations can get a bit confusing due to the lack of structure, but in my opinion Twitter is not the right tool for a long conversation anyway.
