In the last six months Twitter has gone from a small social network to one of the largest social networks out there. I first signed up for Twitter over a year ago. At the time, I didn’t understand the point of it, and walked away for about 10 months.
I soon discovered that the gymnastics community had grown on Twitter and you could follow gymnasts such as Nadia, Dominique, Carly, and Nastia. I was hooked again, it was an instant connection back into the world of gymnastics. One thing lead to another and I discovered a whole world of social media, other sports, photography, and local businesses on Twitter. From that point on, Twitter went from just a way of keeping up with news, to a whole new way of learning new things and meeting new people.
Twitter makes it so easy to find your comfort zone. Adding hash tags to the end of a Tweet, focusing on a single topic, or just looking at those tweeting in your area makes it so easy to find people to talk to. People are on Twitter at all hours of the day, tweeting from all around the world, and talking about so many different topics.
Back in the day when a group of fellow gymnastics webmasters and I would stay up all night waiting for results from events to come in, we’d start up a chat room on AIM and hash out our opinions of the commentary. As the gymnasts are competing in London at the worlds this week, that conversation was missing on AIM… It has now moved to Twitter. Tweets from USA Gymnastics, Inside Gymnastics, and International Gymnast were Re-Tweeted (RT) by fans, other gymnasts, and Olympic committees. When the FIG’s website went down throughout the day, we could rely on someone on Twitter to post the results.
Twitter reminds me of a poem that was written 10 years ago by an anonymous person (back when AIM was THE way to communicate):
We sit and we type, and we stare at our screens
We all have to wonder, what this possibly means.
With our mouse we roam, through the rooms in a maze
Looking for something or someone, as we with in a daze.
We chat with each other, we type all our woes
Small groups we do form, and gang up on our foes.
We wait for somebody, to type out our name.
We want recognition, but it is always the same.
We give kisses and hugs, and sometimes flirt.
In PM’s we chat deeply, and reveal why we hurt.
We do form friendships – but – how, we don’t know
But some of these friendships, will flourish and grow.
Why is it on screen that we can be so bold
Telling our secrets, that have never been told.
Why is it we share the thought in our mind
With those we can’t see, as though we were blind.
The answer is simple, it is as clear as a bell.
We all have our problems, and need someone to tell.
We can’t tell real people, but tell someone we must,
So we turn to the ‘puter, and to those we can trust.
Even though it is crazy, the truth still remains
They are Friends Without Faces, and odd little names.
The ability to have conversations with others through computers has been around for a long time… but Twitter opens up more doors to meet even more people and find information even faster.