The Link between Twitter and your Phone!

I get so angry when people tell me Twitter is for losers, and the only people who tweet are those with no life. Being a full time student, working at target, and interning at The Zimmerman Agency I have a life and a very busy one at that.

As previously stated I am a Twitter addict. I tweet from sun up to sun down and sometimes in my sleep. I can honestly say I send off about 30 tweets a day while according to Emarketer.com about 85.7 percent of all tweeter users only tweet less than once a day. I fall into the 1.13 percent category and tweet about 10 times or more per day. Statistics also show 53 percent of Twitter users never post any updates.

Tweeting this much is not easy especially with such busy days. I go to work and class from 8 a.m. - noon, and then I’m at my internship from 1 p.m. - 6 p.m.; I often ask myself with such a busy day how do I have time to tweet so much?

The answer is my iPhone! I have about 3 twitter applications on my phone and if I would have to estimate I would say 90 percent of my tweets come from my phone. According to comScore Twitter access from a mobile phone has risen from 22.4 percent to 30.8 percent from one year ago. Twitter experienced a 347 percent jump in number of users accessing it through mobile phones.

Why has it raised by so much you ask? Well of course the most obvious reason would be that it’s convenient. Carrying around a large computer while searching for Wi-Fi just to tell your followers your going to lunch isn’t the easiest thing to do. But another reason may be because the Twitter homepage can become a hassle to use when doing more complicated things. Just trying to re-tweet a friend requires me to copy the original message, hit reply, and add a “RT” at the beginning of the message. Applications such as Tweetie and EchoFon make things a lot easier because tweets can be ‘re-tweeted at the click of a button. Tweeting from a mobile phone allows you to tweet pictures, videos, and your location at anytime and although most of these things are possible on a computer it is much more easier on a mobile phone.

Almost 63 percent of Twitter users access there tweets trough a mobile phone.

When people tell me I have no life, and twitter is not for them I often ask them. What type of phone they have and if they can access the Internet on their phone. Surprisingly most of the people I encounter say no. I’m not a social media expert but I believe that the reason most people are not Twitter users because they don’t have time to access it. Even if you are the busiest person in the world I’m sure you have downtime at some point of the day and what is a better way to spend it then tweeting your frustrations away to your friends. To the people who don’t understand Twitter and think it’s lame, all I can say is don’t knock it till you try it.

Flash Mobs: PR Tool or Another form of a Riot!

About a month ago I was quietly working at my desk when I received an email from a fellow employee. I usually don’t stop working to check out personal emails (yea right) but the title read, “You have to see this.” I opened it and there I saw a Youtube video of what appeared to be Gaines Street in Tallahassee, Florida. The video featured a group of people dancing in the middle of Gaines Street and ended promoting the changes coming to Gaines Street.

My first thought after seeing the video were “you got to be kidding me?” I quickly emailed my co-worker back and said “you have just wasted 5 minutes of my life that I will never get back.”

Yesterday Michelle Bono, Assistant to the City Manager, visited my class to speak about the changes coming to Gaines Street and FAMU Way and showed the class the same video I had saw a month ago. She described it as a “flash mob video.” I immediately went home and researched what exactly a flash mob was.

According to Urbandictionary.com a flash mob is describes as “A group of people who appear from out of nowhere, to perform predetermined actions, designed to amuse and confuse surrounding people. The group performs these actions for a short amount of time before quickly dispersing. Flash mobs are often organized through email and/or newsgroup postings.”

The first thing that I thought of after reading this is “what a great tool for PR practitioners to use.” Not only does a flash mob finds a way to interact with the public but it also can provide great media attention if done right.

But a drawback to a flash mob is the fact that it could possibly lead to problems such as violent riots or protest. Take a situation that happened on The University of Tennessee at Chattanooga where a flash mob was organized to celebrate the end of the semester. It quickly got out of hand as students got out of hand when students began to throw bottles as officers. (1)

Another flash mob in Philadelphia turned dangerous when Teenagers met downtown after receiving text messages. Ian Urbina of the New York Times described it as a “ritual that is part bullying, part running of the bulls.” Teens ran down the city of Philadelphia downtown streets assaulting each other and pedestrians. The teenagers also vandalize property throughout the downtown area. (2)

These examples show that flash mobs can indeed be dangerous but only in certain situations. I think that the Gaines Street video is the perfect example of how a flash mob should go. It should not be random, and appear out of nowhere as the definition describes. The Gaines Street example was well thought out and was executed perfectly. I’m sure Michelle Bono thought of everything to the last detail when planning the flash mob event including where traffic would be directed when you have 150 people standing in the middle of the street. The video now has well over 9,000 views and the message of the changes coming to Gaines is spreading across Tallahassee quickly.

I think it is fairly safe to say that when done right a flash mob is another very important tool added to a PR practitioner’s tool belt.

TNN (Twitter News Network)

I have a confession, I am a Twitter addict and I need help. For the last 2 years I have strolled the timeline of my followers, tweet worthless updates, and wasted so much time I could have used to study, do homework, perhaps even start a multimillion dollar business.

But out of all the negatives I have found one thing on Twitter that may validate my time spent telling the world “I’m up eating cereal,” every morning. Many of the events of 2009 including the G-20 summit, North Korea nuclear testing, and the out break of swine flu was all were all introduced to me through Twitter.

As a matter of fact I still can remember the day the late Michael Jackson died. No job, or classes I climbed out of my bed and my first thought was Twitter. Strolling through my timeline I saw tweets of Michael Jackson’s death. My most natural instinct when hearing bad news was to call my mom. But after I asked her about it she didn’t know anything. I turned to CNN and they were only reporting that Michael Jackson was in the hospital. I figured to myself I have fallen for these Twitter lies once again! But sure enough hours later it was reported that Michael Jackson was indeed dead. After pulling myself together and watching the thriller video five times straight I thought to myself is Twitter the new news source?

I spend hours a day on Twitter and only spend about 5 minutes each morning on CNN. One of the main reasons why I tend to spend such a short time on CNN is because most of the stories that interest me most are buried in videos, advertising, and top stories. Although it’s important to know the top stories I wish to know the stories that interest my hobbies and interest. Twitter creates the perfect environment for news that interests me because I follow people who have the same interest as me. So when they post stories that are interesting to them, I take interest and read them.

I am obviously not the only person who thinks this way. A survey done by Mashable.com shows that of the 1,972 respondents 52.3% of them get there news from Twitter and only 21.7% get there news from newspapers. CNN has a Twitter and tweets about each news story they post on their website. The CNN twitter account now has over 3 million followers, which place them at number 14 of the most popular twitter accounts. The New York Times also has a twitter account and is at 25 with over 2 million followers.

Of course people who tweet should take News on twitter with a grain of salt. All news may not be true. We must remember that everyone on Twitter is not trustworthy and rumors can easily widespread to become a trending topic. In my opinion if Twitter can find a way to make certain news tweets verified like they do with celebrity accounts Twitter could easily become the news source for the 21^st century.