Not sure if this is a new term in the English language, but if it is it's going to stick. George Stephanopolous (jeez, hard spell!) is doing a Twitterview with John McCain on Tuesday of next week. Q and A is still going to be limited to the 140 char max so should be a really interesting study in the extent to which message really is medium.
If done correctly, this is just a fantastic example of how different communication types (e.g. public two party interview) can traverse technologies.
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20090313/ap_en_ot/twitter_stephanopoulos_mccain
One issue I have with the approach is that you actually have to follow both George and John in order to see the interview. Seems a more persistent relationship than I'd have hoped when all I want is the transactional value of seeing the Twitterview.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
Great post Samir, as much as any social media platform, Twitter is really putting a microscope to our ideas of effective communication.
ReplyDeleteDailyKos had a great piece a few weeks ago title "The Twittering Class"
http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2009/3/15/14293/8072/16/708827
The title, a play on the "Chattering Class" explores how the established media types and personalities are coming to grips with twitter and conversational mediums.
It truly hit home for me when I saw a message in my inbox from twitter with the text "Karl Rove is now following you on Twitter!" After getting chills all over my body, then discovering that it was in fact the real Karl Rove, I decided to engage him in a genuine dialogue, nothing has come out of it yet, but the idea that I'm a few clicks away from the man I created a complete mythology around definitely struck home for me.
That's quite cool Brett, even if it's sort of analogous to having a message that reads "Satan is following you on Twitter." Better watch out;)
ReplyDeleteOn the serious side, the Kos post points out an interesting phenomonon that I don't really understand. After all, what is it about Twitter that email doesn't have when it comes to actually engaging the sender or having an intern do it in my place? Is it the character max, which keeps things short and efficient, so perhaps that's one? Or maybe it's that it is soo easy to use on mobile devices that dead time becomes interactive time. What else is it about the interaction model that is Twitter that makes these celebs and politicians more willing to personally engage?