Short and sweet. Twittering and updating Facebook status is in a word, perfection (better than gum). It is like walking into a room full of your friends and instantly knowing what everybody is up to, with just a quick glance. One “is relaxing at home” and another “is studying” and yet another “is heading out for Thai food”. Ok, that’s it then. No wondering what’s been happening during the 4 hours since I last checked, I’ll just have a wee glance.
The other part I really like about microblogging is that it seems to encourage response comments even more than “normal” blogging. One “is voting by absentee ballot”, which is followed by “who’d you vote for?” and on and on. In fact I just learned that one of my friends had a baby, he “is trying to remember how to swaddle a wiggly baby”, “your baby?! well done!!!”. It is like a little microcosm of life events, all told in the third person and served up on my news feed.
My supervisor just joined Facebook and asked about that aspect of it, “is it always in the third person?” Yeah, Fa is thinking the third person is kinda weird, but you get used to it. I also can’t quite stop using the “is” even though you don’t need to any more. Fa is attached to the “is”.
Microblogging forces you to concisely describe your mood, activities, disposition, and general state of being in under 255 characters. I guess the trick for me is to figure out what is so appealing about the microblog and replicate it in my regular blog. Shorter posts? More provocative topics? Personal details? Increased frequency?
Fa is thinking that microblogging is worth some additional research and study.
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