Rheingold, whose 2003 SmartMobs was an indirect inspiration for a lot of our initial thoughts about dodgeball, has a nice post up about why he likes Twitter. Some of the ones I agree with most strongly are:
Openness — anyone can join, and anyone can follow anyone else (unless they restrict access to friends who request access)
Immediacy — it’s a rolling present. You won’t get the sense of Twitter if you just check in once a week. You need to hang out for minutes and hours, every day, to get in the groove.
Variety — political or technical argument, gossip, technical info, news flashes, poetry, social arrangements, classrooms, repartee, scholarly references
Reciprocity — people give and ask freely for information they need (this doesn’t necessarily scale or last forever, but right now it’s possible to tune your list — and to contribute to it — to include a high degree of reciprocation)
Asymmetry — very interesting. Very few people follow exactly the same people who follow them.
A window on what is happening in multiple worlds, some of which I am familiar with, and others that are new to me
Smart Mobs » Blog Archive » Why I’m hooked on Twitter
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