Tag: twitter
Twitterer liveblogs his own plane crash
On Saturday night in Denver, Colorado, Continental Airlines flight 737 slid off the runway during takeoff. One of the engines caught fire, but passengers escaped out of the opposite side on slides. Although 38 people were hurt, thankfully no-one was killed.
However, one of the passengers was Mike Wilson, aka @2drinksbehind. He live-Twittered the crash(!), and so if you’re phobic of flying on planes, then you might not want to click over the jump.
Evening Standard fails in its meagre attempts to understand Twitter
Ah, the Evening Standard, that bastion of dead-tree media. The paper has written an article about Twitter – go read it now, I’ll wait. Back? Okay. There are so many things wrong with the article, but I’ll pick three out for special consideration.
Firstly, the assumption that Twitter is just another social network. It’s not. It’s not about pictures, poking or friends lists. Instead, it’s about microblogging – pushing out short updates that say what’s going on in your life.
Secondly, Nick Curtis says that Twitter messages are limited to 160 characters. He’s wrong. It’s 140. C’mon Nick, the simplest of fact checks would have spotted that one.
Lastly, and relatedly, the utter lack of effort that went into researching the article. Here’s Nick’s Twitter account – @NickCurtis. Looks like he’s made a real effort there.
First dog re-homed via Twitter
Meet Gia. Gia is an Irish Water Spaniel, and she’s not the first dog to be re-homed via Twitter. But she nearly was. Let me explain further.
It started with a tweet from @dogstrust, reading “Irish Water Spaniel or classic pic of Kevin Keegan? http://www.tinyurl.com/6g69mx“. One follower replied, whose mum was considering getting a dog. She lived near Dogs Trust Ballymena, so after doing a little bit of research, headed over to the centre that afternoon.
They checked out Gia, and after finding her a little “big and hyper”, instead picked up a Pomeranian cross called Suzie. Suzie moved in today. It’s the first time any animal charity has successfully used Twitter to re-home an animal, so congratulations, Dogs Trust! Gia’s still looking for a home, so if you like what you see above, get in touch!
Dogs Trust Blog (via Dogs Trust Twitter)
Related posts: How Facebook nearly bought Twitter | Terrorists on Twitter? The US Army seem to think so…
How Facebook nearly bought Twitter
When it comes to Social Networking sites, Facebook is the current undisputed king. When it comes to microblogging and ‘status update’, however, Twitter rules. Facebook knows this, which is why it offered US$500 million’s worth of stock to Twitter, three weeks ago, to buy it.
Fortunately, or unfortunately, depending on your perspective, Twitter rebuffed the offer. There were concerns that $500 million of Facebook stock wasn’t actually worth $500 million, as well as worries over how Facebook would integrate the service into the site.
Lastly, it seems that Twitter wants to have a go at seeing if it can make any actual revenue itself first, before letting someone else try. After all, despite having considerable outgoings in server, SMS and staff costs, Twitter doesn’t actually make any money at all. Yet.
Terrorists on Twitter? The US Army seem to think so…
A draft Army intelligence report reckons that terrorists might be able to use popular microblogging service Twitter to co-ordinate attacks against the United States. It follows fears that World of Warcraft might be used for the same purposes both stories beg the question: haven’t the US army got anything better to do…?
Find out how annoying your Twitter friends are with follow cost
Ladies and Gentlemen, I can exclusively reveal that following Tech Digest on Twitter is officially not annoying. Using the *science* perfected by the chaps at Follow Cost, it turns out that we issue just 0.44 updates per day, though that’s slightly higher if you’re just looking at the last hundred days…
Britney Spears is now following me on Twitter
That’s right, the pop princess now has her own Twitter account, or at least ‘her people’ do. At twitter.com/therealbritney, Brit’s “taking you where no paparazzi lens ever could with pics, vids and news from Britney herself”…
Legitimate version of fring comes to iPhone and iPod Touch
fring, the VoIP and instant messaging aggregator software, has now received approval from Apple and is available to download from the App Store for the iPhone and iPod Touch.
A previous beta version, which required a jailbroken iPhone to work, proved extremely popular. Now anyone can get hold of the app that allows them to instant message their contacts on Skype, MSN, Google Talk, ICQ, Twitter, Yahoo! and AIM, as well as make cheap calls via a Wi-Fi connection.
Finally, it’s possible to keep in contact with everyone when away from the desktop environment, and all from the single application…
O'Malley's Mashup: Enhance your Twitter feed
Twitter‘s great. It’s like a secret club where people in the tech sector go to talk about the inanities of their lives… and it’s horrendously addictive. It may surprise you to learn though that Twitter can also be used for some genuinely useful things.
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Okay, that was obviously a lie. But there are many things you can do that will enhance your Twitter feed, and give it the virtual 140-character equivalent of bells and whistles. For this week’s mash-up, I’m going to go through some services that you can hook into Twitter.
Twitter gets a redesign
I don’t think there’s anything else in my life that I have such a love/hate relationship with as Twitter. The addictive microblogging service is down several days each month, annoying for my Facebook friends (because I update 10 times a day) and annoying for those around me. I’ve never gone this far though.
