On Line Opinion is now on Twitter. Another option for following the articles that we post. Our profile is http://twitter.com/onlineopinion. 16 followers in the first hour. Not too bad.

I have clicked GrahamY's link, and perused the linked page. Does that make me a twit? For I did not immediately learn much thereby.

Then I remembered Google was my friend. My friend told me that there were 318,000,000 results for the search term 'Twitter'. I have carefully gone through them all and have come up with this site as a reasonable start point for those OLO users who are unfamiliar with Twitter: http://news.cnet.com/newbies-guide-to-twitter/

Please post links if you can find better, especially as to descriptions as to how particular users make practical use of Twitter. http://tweeternet.com/ may fill this bill, for example - looks good from the list of contents, but I haven't read it fully yet.

I have my doubts as to the extent that Twitter is something the OLO user demographic has yet largely embraced. Or do I plod so far behind the pack that I am utterly out of touch? Still, I sense, rather than properly comprehend, that it is something that could put users into the position of knowing? a little more as to the extent and/or identity of interest topics in General Discussions, in addition to OLO articles, may be attracting. The present 'today's (and this week's) most popular listings obtainable by clicking the 'On Line Opinion' tab at the top of any OLO page then scrolling down to below the latest posted articles, only goes so far in telling viewers the extent of aggregate viewer interest.

It is interesting to note the claim in the link above as to the 'limits to growth' Twitter may face vis-a-vis sustaining reliability of the service. What usually happens when scarcity of a resource becomes evident? Does not the price go up?

Karl Marx, I suggest, may be about to be proven wrong about religion having been the opiate of the masses. It looks more likely that that opiate will prove to be Twitter! Be careful you do not have to pay too much for the life you get, Twitterbugs.

GrahamY wrote 30 March 2009 5:43:56 PM:

"On Line Opinion is now on Twitter..."

I have to confess while I have been on Twitter for a few months, I still don't get what all the fuss is about.

A few weeks ago I went to the Innovative Ideas Forum. The National Library of Australia provided power and WiFi so fifteen of us could twitter and blog: http://www.nla.gov.au/initiatives/meetings/innovative-ideas-forum/2009/web.html

The next day I went to BarCamp Canberra 2, where about half the room was twittering: http://search.twitter.com/search?q=%23bcc2

Then I tried it on my own at the Operation Sunlight briefing: http://search.twitter.com/search?q=%23opsun

While I can work the technology, I still don't quite see what the point is. But then it took me three presentations, over several weeks, to work out what the world Wide Web was. Two presentations I attended and then one I gave, using the web instead of Powerpoint: http://www.tomw.net.au/hitech.html

One of the advantages of OLO being on Twitter is that articles are exposed to a wider viewing audience, that of those monitoring Twitter for anything posted on particular subjects, and that of any Twitter user 'following' (to use Twitter parlance) OLO (as I do).

For the registered OLO user, the list of new articles published daily can now be obtained in two places.

The conventional one is on the ON LINE OPINION page, here: http://www.onlineopinion.com.au/ . Note that the lists on this page do not have the OLO-composed by-line you see once an article has attracted its first comment, which event establishes it upon the OLO Article index page.

The new one is, of course Twitter. The article title is displayed, together with some or all of the OLO by-line and a tinyurl link direct to the article on the OLO site. This may prove a more convenient access point to new articles for those unfamiliar with the OLO site. I remember it took me ages to find where new articles came from: I wonder how many articles have languished, never drawing a comment, simply because a significant number of users may never have known how articles became established in the index?

I anticipate seeing many newly registered OLO userIDs cropping up as first posters on new articles. I expect GrahamY does too. Expect many of such to be of world wide dispersal, due to the nature of Twitter.

If this post inspires any existing OLO user to sign up for the free Twitter service, and that user wishes to preserve the anonymity afforded by their OLO alias, I would suggest they first study at least the first two posts to the current topic 'Twitter potentially breaches OLO pseudonym protection', here: http://forum.onlineopinion.com.au/thread.asp?discussion=2661 , before completing the Twitter sign-up dialog. Those posts warn as to how an OLO user could unknowingly reveal their real name to the world, and how to simply avoid this risk.

An interesting move on OLO's part, Graham. I watch, intrigued.

Posted by Forrest Gumpp, Thursday, 9 April 2009 11:56:28 AM:

"The conventional one is on the ON LINE OPINION page, here: http://www.onlineopinion.com.au/ . Note that the lists on this page do not have the OLO-composed by-line you see once an article has attracted its first comment, which event establishes it upon the OLO Article index page."

It is 12:15 EST and I just check the linked ON LINE OPINION page. The OLO-composed by-lines ARE there! I'm sure they weren't before when I composed my 11:56:28 AM post.

Either I'm losing it, or the OLO editoriate have very quickly fixed up what may have been an omission from that page. Which is it GrahamY or SusanP? My sanity may well be at stake here.

I am come not to break Godwin's Law, but to fulfil it.

There is some interesting and amusing stuff that comes to light on Twitter. It is sort of virally propagated by 'retweeting', whereby those on Twitter, seeing something that tickles their fancy, republish it including the userID of the poster of the tweet from which it, or the relevant link, came.

This is a link to a 3 minute 36 second YouTube video clip titled 'No Twitter for Hitler': http://www.twooting.com/members/twooting/videos/VIEW/00000008/No-Twitter-for-Hitler.html . Particularly appropriate for a forum discussion, I think, given that it is to forum discussions generally that Godwin's Law applies.

It is posted on the twooting.com website. Twooting is a podcast site about Twitter: two blokes have got a life there talking about Twitter related issues. When I retweeted it by clicking the retweet button, the original source was automatically credited with being 'tweetmeme', and the link was automatically shortened by the Twitter software to this: http://bit.ly/MDi1

Worth a look if you want a laugh. You don't have to be on Twitter to use my unabbreviated link. It seems there have been issues with Twitter's uptime, or the lack of it.

When retweeting it I couldn't resist adding this parodied line from that old WW2 song: "Just who do you think you think you are tweeting Mr Hitler, if you know that Twitter's down?". It all fitted within the 140 character limit. The video clip for some reason brought to mind a line from the 1960 song 'Wooden Heart', which I separately tweeted together with the abbreviated link: "Tweet me right, tweet me good, tweet me like you really should, for I'm not made of wood, and I don't have a wooden heart!", all of which also neatly just fitted within the limit.

Drivel, isn't it?

And to think GrahamY actually 'follows' me on Twitter following all this stuff! Its almost enough to make one write a flaming Haiku celebrating it.