For the longest time, I have resisted engaging with Twitter. I really didn’t think I had the time to keep up with yet another social media outlet in addition to my blog, my website, and Facebook site – and keep up with all the sites that I follow. From a business aspect, it is good to reach clients where they are and people have so many ways now of discovering your work.
In a moment of weakness about a month ago, I created a Twitter account. With the recent news of an overthrow of the government in Tunisia that was largely coordinated through Twitter and such, it has obviously proven itself to be a powerful communication tool. Gee, welcome to the 21st century Graf!
I engaged Twitter as a raw newbie, and through the help and warm welcoming of some fellow photographers, I gained some “followers.” When I started to try to keep up with all that was going on, I felt like a bird pecking seed on the ground. If you feel so compelled, feel free to click that little “t” in my sidebar on the right under Follow Me.
Some tasty seed indeed. I did discover some new stuff, some quite interesting articles, and a rather hilarious video that quickly became one of my favorites. Nightime! Daytime! (follow the link and that will make more sense. 🙂 ) Would I have found them otherwise? Maybe, maybe not. For sure it seems like a very quick and easy way to share information.
You would think that you could digest 140 characters of information pretty quickly. But it is quite deceiving, those 140 characters typically link to much larger diversions. Peck one seed and you found it only poked a hole in a 25-pound bag.
I still feel a bit lost in how to engage and manage Twitter information. Tweets and Retweets, Follow Fridays – so much new lingo to learn. Basically, it seems like one big linkfest of articles, blog updates, and promotional bits that aren’t even connected via threads. I have surfed around to follow various organizations and people and see numbers where people are following hundreds if not thousands of others. I should have known that similar to Facebook friends, the more you follow, the more links and other bits of information are thrown at you. All these seeds take you off in a hundred different directions on the net and can consume a massive amount of time.
Well, the same thing happens with Facebook friends, email subscriptions, mailing lists, feed readers, etc. It amounts to a tremendous amount of information overload. Once engaged, it becomes almost like keeping up with your favorite TV show. You miss an episode, and you feel a bit lost – crap! what did I miss?! What happened in Tunisia? Heck, even my TV has an option on it for keeping up with Facebook and Twitter – must be for commercial breaks. I can see how some people end up with real problems with this stuff. What is driving such a need to be so connected throughout every aspect of our lives?
How long will it be before there is an optical chip implant that can just feed this stuff right into your brain? After all, get rid of these inefficient interfaces that take up so much space and time. Much easier for advertisers, they can just poll what you are thinking! Maybe we can just consume this stuff while we sleep? But therein lies the point right? The devices have an on/off switch.
I am willing to try Twitter for a while and see how it works out, and learn more about what it is good for and what it isn’t. But there is one thing for sure, the more seeds I peck, the larger desire I have to simply unplug, turn off the switches, sit by a tree in the woods, listen to the birds, or just the wind. They don’t care if you are listening or not. No obligations to stay up to date, no obligations to consume any information, and they certainly don’t care what you ate for breakfast, except if you have a little seed to share.
Interesting post, Mark. Thanks for sharing your experience of a Twitter “newbie”. I am still resisting fb and twitter because of lack of time (and even unwilligness to spend time with them) and because I know how easily can one become addicted to media and information. The more you like what you get the deeper you delve 🙁
Wonderful colors and silhouettes of birds
Very beautiful picture
Excellent post! I just started my twitter feed last week and reading of your experience is very helpful as I start to see the time and attention that the extra exposure brings with it.
As far as Twitter goes, I do not feel an organic connection to it like I feel for Facebook, but I think it can be a valuable tool to expand my audience beyond the Facebookers and those who might find my web presence otherwise. Thanks again for your insight!
Thank you John. Good luck to you on diving in!
Welcome to the club Mark. 🙂 I’ve always preferred Twitter for professional networking and site promotion because it’s a public forum. I mainly use FB to keep in touch with friends and relatives so I’m more selective in who I let follow me on there though I have to admit there are a few people on my FB whom I have no idea who they are.
It is growing on me Richard as I get a bit more used to it. I am personally getting tired of FB’s continual grab for your information – having to be worried about what setting did they create for advertisers and set as default this time.
Thanks for all the feedback on this post. I didn’t get a chance this week to reply to as many of you as I had hoped … I actually did unplug for a bit. 🙂
I can sure relate Mark, the more I get involved the more I feel like I have to stay caught up on Everything! I’ve been hanging around twitter for almost 6 months now and need to make it a nearly daily routine or forget it all together. I am going to make a strong effort to become more engaged with it myself because I do think it has it’s place and benefits in staying caught up in the ever changing communication scene. Technology should make ones life easier shouldn’t it? I swear I can remember hearing that at some point. Information overload, the unintended consequence.
That’s all I have time to say for now I have to check twitter, facebook, 2 email accounts and get a post ready for my blog! See ya in the twittersphere…
By the way the video is absolutely hilarious! Thanks for sharing.
I’m afraid Twitter is a little too ADD for me. But it may be I’ve never learned how to follow and track tweets. Good luck on your “experience.”
A beautiful photo, Mark. The colors are attention grabbing to say the least. I like!
I hear ya! I’m guilty of using all this media, but knowing when to shut it off tests my limits!
I love your image, but wonder if it was taken before or after the bird deaths earlier this winter. I’m hoping it is recent, because I’m afraid we won’t see any Red Wings this summer.
Thanks Roberta, the image is from this previous fall.
I really enjoyed this post and your take on and approach to Twitter. I look forward to following any updates you give us on the blog about how it is going. Better you than me, I say, as far as testing it out to see what it’s like. I appreciate being able to watch you eat the seed in case it is like the cool aid, though I doubt it will kill you, just kill your time. When I sally forth out of my lair these days, I notice that people in the real world are way too busy to talk to each other. Probably because they are too busy tweeting and twirping and drinking the cool aid of the technology world. Though I’m sure at some point I will get up on these devices, right now I don’t have time nor do I want to give up any more peaceful, quiet time for more chatter.
You’re at least two steps ahead of me Mark. I find my website and blog to be about as much as I can keep up with.
Over the past year, Twitter won a place in my daily routine. I think the key is figuring out what role you want it to play.
Many social media gurus try to make bold claims about Twitter being some awesome new vehicle for marketing and sales that everyone HAS to get on. But I don’t buy it. I’m sure there are some who use it that way, and good for them. But it’s not for me.
Instead, Twitter has become my substitute for the water-cooler. Being an artist is a lonely career, so I use Twitter to help change that. I follow a bunch of other artists, and am able to have little conversations throughout the day. It’s my way to step away from the desk (so to speak) and chill out for a few moments here and there. I don’t have any higher expectations than that, and it works well.
I also have mixed feelings about twitter, and the others like facebook.
I have accounts, but seldom get around to looking at them.
I can see where twitter could be a useful tool if you use it right, but a colossal waste of time if you don’t. Whatever using it right might entail is still beyond my limited comprehension.
I shudder at the thought of that implanted chip — there are times I think even having a damn computer is bad enough…
I was exhausted by the time I finished just reading about keeping up with it all! I do well to somewhat keep up with what I am into now. I will have to remain content with at least one foot in the last century.
It’s obvious to anyone who follows you here that you will have a good time with Twitter and get the most out of it possible. I also trust that you will make time to listen to the wind.
Twitter reminds me of the fire hose scene where I’m choking on water. I signed up about a year ago and maybe look once a month. I have little knowledge of what people are saying as it is a language all it’s own. It also moves us farther away from the face-to-face conversations.I still not sure about it.
I have had a twitter account for a year now, but can’t really say that I’m hooked. I guess I’m one of these birds that don’t sing. If I were, I would probably have been mute anyway, because of the alarm.
Great post, Mark. I felt the same way about twitter and I resisted it for a long time. A little over a year ago I made the decision to dive head first into the world of social media with a blog, twitter account, flickr and Facebook. It’s taken a lot more time and effort than I anticipated but lo and behold, I’m seeing results. Has it been worth it? Yes and no. Business has increased dramatically: workshops and guiding (moderate), print sales (dramatic), stock image licensing (minimally). But, I do spend less time outdoors making new images and more time marketing and fulfilling orders. It’s a give and take, I guess.
At any rate, I’m excited you’re on twitter and I look forward to keeping up with you there – at least until the need or desire to sit under a tree and listen to the wind blow takes precedent. 😉
I feel the same way. I am a tweeter newbie and find it pretty great for getting to know great photographers such as yourself but overwhelming as well.
I know what you mean Mark….there is such an overwhelming amount of social media, blogs, websites, Facebook that it does become overwhelming. For me (and this may not be the case for others) my Twitter account is used but not very frequently. Not that it isn’t fun, but there is only so much time and it is one of those things that has fallen towards the bottom of my list.
In the best of all possible worlds I think we would all need a “Social Media Director” to read our social media and forward on the good stuff as well as Tweet and Facebook for us (not to mention the many social media outlets that I am not using).
I finally realized that one can subscribe to blogs by e-mail and so now, to a certain extent, the good stuff comes to me. Now I can be one of your early post commenters instead of the last :>)
By the way, I will add you to my Twitter follow list!