Thing #42

Tweet, tweet, yourself, already.

Ok, I couldn't resist. I can really see this working for the libraries and for librarians with services, such as story times, special programs, reference, and even advertising new books, etc. I'm not in that category so it's different for me.
But I didn't remember working with Twitter except for a little searching for tweets about my home town etc., so went a little further, this time, put up my picture, entered info in my bio, and followed more people. I even have followers, this time. I think it's connected to my blog, but I'm not certain. And what others twitter about can be interesting, since I'm following libraries (Omaha Public, Lincoln Public, New York Public, and British Public...real spoilers the last two.) I have written a few tweets, even. And responded to a couple. Although no one has responded to my first one, and that's the one I really wanted to hear from.

I don't see the libraries using it much as a conversation, though. Some do make conversation starting comments, but often its more of an announcement of an upcoming event. And a box about "Twitterquette for Institutions" comments that it should be a conversation, not "a broadcast medium".

I'm also following a couple publishers (Tor--Science Fiction, Penguin--paperbacks), and Penguin, of all things, is following me back.

My next challenge tweeting will be adding a web site, still haven't done that. I've known about tiny.url for a long time, but never used it, and soon I may have to.

I was going to go on and do the next step, then read the articles, and felt like it was all well and fine, but what did it have to do with me. But I came back to it, and tried Twellow, looking for other professional librarians on twitter. And using "librarians" in the search mode didn't pull up as many hits as using their Twellow Categories--libraries and librarians are on page 10. So I clicked the "add me" to the category, so I'll show up. Most of the librarians who twitter are reference or tech librarians, it seems. But I found a few more folk to follow, even some I knew, who hadn't popped up with the first search. And then there's the Twellowhood, click it and get a map of the world, click on the area you're interested in, down to the state/province level, and it lists the cities, and the number of twitterers there. Some very low numbers for some of our small towns, like my home town-2, the country seat-6, but Norfolk was 130 I think. There may have been more, actually, these may only be the ones listed with Twellow. And not as many buisinesses as I would have thought.