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Mary Ellen Bates
Bates Information Services, Inc.
8494 Boulder Hills Dr.
Niwot, Colorado 80503 USA
Tel: 303.772.7095
Email: mbates@batesinfo.com
Skype: Mary.Ellen.Bates
Twitter: www.twitter.com/mebs
LinkedIn:
www.linkedin.com/in/maryellenbates
Bates Information Services, Inc.
8494 Boulder Hills Dr.
Niwot, Colorado 80503 USA
Tel: 303.772.7095
Email: mbates@batesinfo.com
Skype: Mary.Ellen.Bates
Twitter: www.twitter.com/mebs
LinkedIn:
www.linkedin.com/in/maryellenbates
- Influence—calculated by how many people follow you, how often others forward your tweets to others, as well as some secret-sauce algorithm of other factors
- Signal-to-noise ratio—a rough calculation of how often you pass along useful information, such as a URL
- Generosity—your propensity to "re-tweet" (forward) others' tweets
- Velocity—the volume and frequency of your tweets. Be forewarned that Twitter limits you to 1,500 tweets a week, and if you are tweeting that much, you need an intervention!
- Clout—the number of times that another twitterer has mentioned you by Twitter-name.
Clearly, these are measurements that are looking at far more than how often someone tweeted about their love life or their dinner plans. While these factors are crude at best, the fact that we can now measure the impact that a twitterer has on the broader community is a good sign that Twitter is starting to be seen as a serious tool for serious researchers.
So, the next time you hear someone say, "Oh, I just can't be bothered with learning all these new social sites - I'm much more professional", remind them that Twitter can be a tool for grownups as well as for teens intent on sharing their love life with the world.
I can't remember a day in the last few weeks when there wasn't an article in the press about Twitter. Most of the articles are along the lines of either "Frankly, my dear, I don't care what you had for breakfast" or "If you aren't twittering, you're tragically un-hip." Neither of these is an accurate representation of Twitter, of course, and both miss the point of what Twitter's real value is. Before you either dismiss Twitter as self-indulgent drivel or immerse yourself in it 24/7, consider another perspective on what Twitter is really all about.
In a nutshell, Twitter is a blog host. Yes, it's unlike most blog hosts, in that your postings are limited to 140 characters. But just as you could go to Librarian of Fortune to read my regular blog, you can go to twitter.com/mebs to read my blog posts (a.k.a. tweets) on my Twitter "blog".
When you "follow" someone on Twitter, you're really just subscribing to an RSS feed of their (Twitter micro-)blog. You are not expected to read everything they say any more than a blogger expects you to pay deep and close attention to every blog post. So, for example, when I log into my Twitter account, I see tweets (a.k.a. blog posts) of all the people I'm interested in, just as I could go to my RSS reader and check out the blog updates to the bloggers I'm watching. I skim through what people are talking about, looking for anything interesting— whether I'm on Twitter or on my blog RSS reader.
One interesting feature that differentiates Twitter is that you can see what Twitter feeds others are monitoring; in the rest of the blogosphere, I can't see what blogs others are monitoring. This means that I can expand my early-warning network by seeing who people I respect are following on Twitter, and following those people as well. The only equivalent in the "traditional" blogosphere is looking at ther bloggers' blog rolls (i.e., lists of the blogs that a blogger lists as valuable).
Twitter is as relevant to researchers as any other blog, and for much the same reason. I use blogs (including Twitter) to learn about new ideas and new resources, and to listen to what thought leaders have to say. And strategic tweeters, just like strategic bloggers, understand that their success lies in maintaining a high signal-to-noise ratio, to share thoughtful comments and insights into their industry. Just as I would not expect to see posts in ResourceShelf.com that talk about the editors' dyspepsia that day, I don't expect to see a steady stream of updates from the people I follow on Twitter that don't have useful content.
Blogs encourage participation by allowing readers to comment on their blog posts, thereby creating a community discussion around a topic. Likewise, Twitter has a number of features that let readers interact with the tweetosphere. Readers can respond to a tweet (similar to a blog "comment"). They can forward on to their followers ("re-tweet") a Twitter message they find useful just as they would link to it in a blog post.
One of the best indicators that Twitter is being seen as a powerful research and information-gathering tool is Twitalyzer, which in essence measure how collaborative and interactive a twitterer is. Rather than simply measuring how many times someone has tweeted, it looks at five factors:
May 2009
by Mary Ellen Bates
Bates Information Services
Bates Information Services
Twitter in Context