The Conversation is getting boring: sifting the News from the Noise? (ctd)

Your viewpoint is pretty provocative and I agree with you to some extent. Most tweets are of the back-slapping variety. Maybe it's because Twitter is primarily a networking forum. I doubt most people would go to an in-person networking event and start criticizing people. "Oh, your last blog post was just awful." The medium's more about spotting things you like. Most people on Twitter are bloggers or other people working at building their tribe. Maybe it's harder to do that by being snarky or explaining what you don't like about something. It seems like it's important to keep this in mind if you're using Twitter as a journalist. What's the motive behind this person's tweets? Most serious Twitter users probably have one.

Laura, I think a separate account is an excellent idea - it not only takes the noise away from your normal feed it also enables you to measure the interest in what you are doing - simply by seeing who signs up to it. As regards other tools people are going to have to start being more honest with themselves. How big I deal is this? Just because I can stream it does that mean I should? Audio Boo? Really? And in terms of what you are producing - try and promote debate. Ask questions. Provoke responses. If you allow it you hashtagged noise will have no value and it will all be about the quality of the coffee or @ name dropping for ego and self advancement. Also - encourage blogging. Whatever the wider advancements have been in web2.0 it's still about blogging. Everything else is just signposts. If we lose blogs and bloggers then all we have are signposts sending us round in circles.

I agree with Caitlin: if you are going to tweet from an event or conference, set up a separate account. You can always direct people there and/or use hashtags. I started using Twitter at an event run by the Craigslist Foundation at NYU summer of 2008. I wanted to share what I was learning with friends who couldn't attend, and I knew my followers were interested in the subject. It worked beautifully but I knew the majority of my community was interested. For AsburyPop, I set up a separate Twitter account and will tweet about the event and during the event just from that account ... although I admit a few slips because I use Tweetdeck and sometimes forget what account I am on - people seem to forgive me though! The Number One Rule of Twitter is Know Your Audience. Rule Number Two? Keep checking in with Rule Number One.

Excellent example of HOW TO live blog successfully here: (joanne jacobs on Nico MacDonald Innovation Reading Circle event Monday 14th) http://joannejacobs.net/?p=1165 wonders of the real-time intrawebs innit?

http://ukwebfocus.wordpress.com/2009/09/14/use-of-twitter-at-the-altc-2009-conference/ the above link is quite interesting on this subject chris

Agree with Caitlin there, we did the same for @nextgenus conference, it makes life a lot simpler if you know you are gonna be doing a deluge of tweets. I lost many great followers before I realised some were following me for farming info, and weren't interested in the broadband stuff. If a bigger than normal farm issue comes up I would revert to a lesser used twitter account and use the #farm hashtag so I don't mess up my broadband followers. Suppose when you have more than one interest it can get tricky, and that is why people have multiple accounts. Probably easier not to overtweet and just keep one account? Easier said than done for some of us though. ;) I do like your idea of just adding some letters to your original twitter name for one off events. Will copy that idea. (Imitation is the sincerest form of flattery) cheers chris

I think most conference tweeting is bait and switch. People follow you for your everyday Twitter stream and then suddenly you are filling it with an excessive stream of tweets about a conference. I refuse to use my personal account (@niltiac) in this way. That's not to say that Twitter isn't useful for conferences but I think it requires a little thought. I was hired to tweet for FIPP 2009 World Magazine Congress - so, at my suggestion, we set up a @fipp2009 account to do it from. More recently I knew I'd be spending four days at the Book Passage Travel Writing and Photography Conference and that there was a subset of my followers who would like to know what was going on. I also knew that many of my followers wouldn't care. I wanted to cater for both so I set up @niltiac_bp, told my followers on @niltiac about it, and used the #bptravel hashtag. I ended up with over 100 people following on @niltiac_bp over the four days but I didn't annoy the other 1500-odd people who follow @niltiac.

Steve - Re: the "taking on" feel this might well be a case where 140chars sometimes makes for slightly unintelligent use of language? - in which case mea maxima culpa. I actually meant "taking on" or "tackles" in the sense of "addresses" but I can see how you might feel that "taking on" gave the wrong impression. Tweet deleted. Thanks for excellent and thought-provoking post.

thanks Dee, but don't profess to be an author, just like commenting on other people's profound works... ...the beauty of blogs as opposed to twitter is there is room for explanations, and sometimes one feels compelled to agree, or disagree. That is the reason for blogging as opposed to tweeting. A place for everything. People can't write blogs when attending a conference, but can tweet interesting points,which later serve as the basis for a longer commentary, via a blog or website. Interesting to see the two sides of the story in the posts on this blog. Brian supporting and Steve opposing back channels. Yep, very interesting. Of course the majority don't even discuss it, they just use the tools of their choice and don't even think about it. I stick by my original idea, Steve hasn't figured out how to make the tool work for him, whereas Brian has. Like you I also have ended up following people from all different walks of life and interests. I gain and lose followers every day. The ones who stick with me know that when I am following a conf they will get lots of tweets on that subject, and if it isn't of interest to them they can unfollow for the day or just ignore me. The next day I will probably be tweeting stuff they want to hear. With twitter you have to be selective who you follow, and engage with people. At conferences twitter also gives the little person at the back a voice, and also people all over the world a chance to contribute. A back channel is a good thing, as long as it doesn't take over. It is a tool. Noble are the people using it. Far easier to sit back and just soak it in, but who is taking the notes? Twitter is. You only have to look. As for tweeting inanely,its the little inane tweets that brighten up the day. Some of the cleverest most useful people I follow do the odd 'what i had for breakfast' tweets but it just makes them more human. Bots can be boring. If twitter was just bots tweeting nobody would use it. Its us humans that are harnessing the tech and bringing out the good. (and the bad) As ever, just my humble opinion. chris

Just wanted to put a couple of things straight...in the tweeting of this I was billed as taking on @sambrook and @brian_condon. Not true. I am not sure how I could be perceived as taking on @sambrook as if I'd blame him for bring crawled to. Again as to @brian_condon again..no, no disrespect there. No taking on. This is not a personal attack on ANYBODY. Just reflection on a culture that is growing while at the same time producing fewer fewer ideas and genuine debate.

Thanks as ever for input Chris. Personally, though, Steve has indeed got me thinking a little harder about tweeting inanely about a few pet topics. Trouble is that, I suspect, like many others, I have many sub-sets of Twitter mates: the translators, the runners, the journos, the dog lovers.. (I also have rugby and cricket gangs and am an honorary & honoured member of the Brummie tweet collective!) Ergo, not everything I tweet will interest everyone who follows me - eg I have mates in Holland & Portugal/Brazil & so - shock horror - occasionally tweet in the language in question (matter of courtesy and not just showing off...) IMHO the back channel is both a blessing & a curse - yes, self-censoring, sometimes cruel but often illuminating. Maybe you should write a guest post?!

Disagree,if it wasn't for live tweets coming out of these meetups then people wouldn't know what was going on. Not everyone has the time or money to attend conferences, and twitter back channels are brilliant. Tweeters know how to filter for content, and don't follow people who clog up the works by arselicking as you like to call it. Just because some do please don't tar us all with the same brush. Twitter is a conversation, and it isn't boring. A lot of conversations do go somewhere, but some don't. Just like in real life? Methinks you protest too much. But there again, that idea is my own opinion, and you may think its boring. In that case don't follow me.