Twitter Blog Post

Are you following me?

"Just made a sandwich #yummy" announces @MickBurns23 with glee. His fifty online followers can now relax, knowing that he is no longer hungry.

Twitter users, and there are 100 million active users at this current time, spend hours of their lives posting personal updates up to the amount of 140 characters. 50% of these users log in everyday, both to post and to read about each others thoughts and feelings. And the best thing? You don't even need to know who's feelings they are. This is the supposed beauty of microblogging, that the users are connected to the whole world, not just people they know. There are users in Australia, Russia, Brazil, parts of Africa, Span, the UK and both North and South American to name but a few destinations that your followers could be living.

If you're still confused about what twitter actually is, K Bevan explains "Twitter, for those not in the know, is a collection of microblogs where people post their minute-by-minute thoughts and actions." This means that on Twitter you can post whatever you want and people will be able to see it and more people seem to be finding their way into the birdhouse and creating accounts, with eleven accounts created each minute. 750 tweets are tweeted each second and on a  busy day, twitter can see over 175 million tweets. That's a lot of chirping. 

But why are people so attracted to Twitter? Ann Handley says that "Twitter gives me an immediate pulse on news and events, and what people are talking about, often before any news outlet". This means that people are not only updated on casual goings on but also on important world-wide events. Twitter keeps you linked to every user, in every country, and often they will report a big news event before the media can. Twitter has been utilised by campaigns such as No More Page Three to keep followers and supporters updated on how well they're doing and also to attract more attention. See, the more people tweet about something, the more people from all over the world will see it.

Whatever you feel about twitter, it's here to stay; and seeing as if Twitter was a country, it would be the twelfth largest, I'd be preparing for a bird-shaped take-over if I were you.

Bibliography

Beevolve. (10/10/12). An Exhaustive Study of Twitter Users Across the World. Available: http://www.beevolve.com/twitter-statistics/#a3. Last accessed 17/10/13.

Bevan, K (06/03/08) article for The Guardian, Why are there no spam or trolls on twitter? Available: http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/2008/mar/06/socialnetworking.spam Last Accessed 11/07/13 

Collier, s (16/07/12) 20 illuminating facts about Twitter: 2012 edition article on PR Daily http://www.prdaily.com'Main/Articles/20_illuminating_facts_about_twitter_2012_edition_12138.aspx# Last accessed 11/07/13 [relaible source?]

Enlow, B. (10/04/13). 15 awesome facts about twitter by @ShiftDM.Available: http://www.slideshare.net/KennethBradleyEnlow/20-awesome-facts-about-twitter. Last accessed 17/10/13.

Handley, A. (01.20.09). Why Do People Use Twitter?. Available: http://www.mpdailyfix.com/why-do-people-use-twitter/. Last accessed 17/10/13.