Bebo, Facebook and now Twitter

LadyDee

Heya,

A quick question... in Ireland the first big internet social site was Bebo, then Facebook and now... Twitter? How many people have Twitter accounts, do you like the site, or is it a waste of time?:rolleyes:

Fighting Irish

Twitter is easily the worst

ntlbell

depends what you want to use it for or why your using it.

if you want to tell the world how long it's taken you to have a ****

your making a cup of tea

or what your watching on tv

it's pretty useless.

but it can be used intelligently

Zascar

Twitter is absolutely massive and growing at staggering rates (1382%).

Many people before they knew what bebo or facebook was said it was sh!t etc and then later they become semi addicted and live on it. I'm not a massive twitter fan I look at it occasionally - but I understand its importance. It all depends on who you are following.

LadyDee

ntlbell wrote: »

depends what you want to use it for or why your using it.

if you want to tell the world how long it's taken you to have a ****

your making a cup of tea

or what your watching on tv

it's pretty useless.

but it can be used intelligently

Any ideas on how to use Twitter intelligently?

ntlbell

LadyDee wrote: »

Any ideas on how to use Twitter intelligently?

Again it depends what you want from it.

I'm not sure where to start, it's literally endless.

Let me give an example.

So someone wanted to setup an IT conference in Dublin city.

being new to the city they didn't know that many people.

so they create an account for the conference login to twitter and started searching for people in dublin that are "twittering" about topics they want at the conference for example.

Then they engage those people and start following them, while engaging with them they can get target all their followers as to what's going on.

So they started "re-tweeting" to their followers who are following them because they're interested in the original subject matter.

Now within a few hours you have targeted the exact people you wanted to, engaged with them, advertised your conference etc.

so within a few days the signup's etc are flooding in because it's all from reliable sources you have got to via their contacts etc

This is something fairly simple but trying to do this via any other medium would of been a bit of a nightmare.

I would say at this point most of value in twitter is unknown but it's scary how powerful it could turn out to be if used in the right way

and the "i'm sitting on the toilet pot" gang don't come and ruin it like they ruin everything else

LadyDee

Im doing a college thesis on social networking sites, i.e Facebook, Bebo, Twitter etc... Bebo was huge in Ireland from the word go, and Facebook is used mostly by the 24+ age group, so where does Twitter fit in?

My research so far Im beginning to believe that people are just initially curious about Twitter so they join up .... and then nothing Irish people dont engage with the site. Would this be correct, what do you do.. just ignore all the hype and stick to Facebook and Bebo, or do you use twitter for its ability to provide you with fast answers to questions?

mac_attack

Yup I preety much fall into that you described, got an email from a friend who had joined twitter and signed up to see what all the fuss was about, realised nobody I knew was on it, so never bothered signing in again. I would say its the same for alot of Irish people too.

chixer.norma

LadyDee wrote: »

Heya,

A quick question... in Ireland the first big internet social site was Bebo, then Facebook and now... Twitter? How many people have Twitter accounts, do you like the site, or is it a waste of time?:rolleyes:

I dont have a twitter but i dont think ti is necessarily a waste of time. Obviously you aren't apeaking to the person to their face, which is a problem with all of the sites, but it still a fast, eassy way of communicating with people who are travelling, or who you haven't seen for a while. Im just a bit worried of people you dont know who say they are 22 or something and might actually be 50... No way of knowing the truth.
I dont think they are a waste of time, but as with all things, there is a security risk....

Moonstar

SMS for the web

Yeah I think Twitter hasn't fully reached it's potential in Ireland yet, however it is very noticeable how it has grown massively worldwide in the past 6 months or so.

It's showing no signs of slowing down, so I would expect it to enter the collective conciousness of the general Irish public in another 6 months or so.

Chefdf

Im on twitter. Can see the benefits of it but nobody else is really on it yet. I spose it will take time but eventually everybody will make the jump across.

rikerdonegal

Seems like a huge waste of time to me.

But I'm currently giving it a shot.

Can't figure out, yet, how to make it work from my phone , but I'll get there...

cpu-dude

Bebo I did like at first, it was different and customisable but it got ****e (and full of spam etc) as well as kids. I've recently joined Facebook and I really like it, nice options for chats and updates and the IM is great. Twitter... meh, never looked into until it made the news about CNN and Ashton Kutcher and I still wasn't interested, I'm very surprised it so popular.

You can use 160 characters in a text message but only 140 on Twitter? Ridiculous!

bmcgrath

Bebo is a pile of s...
Facebook is handy, great for photos and keeping in touch with friends back home.
Twitter is my new best friend. Great tool for finding out information quickly, it's pretty big over here in Australia, and for me, I like having it for news alerts etc.

swingking

I use it for catching up on people who have youtube channels. Particularly tech.

I watch people's channels on YouTube and then I might follow them on twitter to see what willbe coming up in future reviews.

Twitter is used by a lot of companies to market and to promote new products, specials deals going on and special promotions (ie. giveaways)

Best advice for twitter is to try it

STBR

Chefdf wrote: »

Im on twitter. Can see the benefits of it but nobody else is really on it yet. I spose it will take time but eventually everybody will make the jump across.

Yeah, "eventually".

Most of the Irish seem to be so behind when it comes to the internet and social networks.

I mean, I was using Twitter in early 2007.

And most Irish people are only joining Twitter now, and not even using it fully still.

And by the time they finally start using regularly, the rest of the world will have moved onto the next eCraze.

STBR

Moonstar wrote: »

SMS for the web

Yeah I think Twitter hasn't fully reached it's potential in Ireland yet, however it is very noticeable how it has grown massively worldwide in the past 6 months or so.

It's showing no signs of slowing down, so I would expect it to enter the collective conciousness of the general Irish public in another 6 months or so.

At which time the rest of the world will have moved on to the next eCraze. :pac:

STBR

cpu-dude wrote: »

Bebo I did like at first, it was different and customisable but it got ****e (and full of spam etc) as well as kids. I've recently joined Facebook and I really like it, nice options for chats and updates and the IM is great. Twitter... meh, never looked into until it made the news about CNN and Ashton Kutcher and I still wasn't interested, I'm very surprised it so popular.

You can use 160 characters in a text message but only 140 on Twitter? Ridiculous!

Quote from Twitter.

Why 140 characters?
We like to keep it short and sweet! It also just so happens that 140 characters is the perfect length for sending status updates via text message. The standard text message length in most places is 160 characters per message. We reserve 20 characters for people's names, and the other 140 are all yours!

Mimikyu

This post has been deleted.

rikerdonegal

Well, it's been something like three weeks now and I'm still enjoying using twitter.

Found this:

http://agtweet.com/

With my current O2 package, it means my 'tweets' are free.

Up to this I never really used Facebook or Bebo much, but since twitter updates them for me, it means they are getting updated, too, and my friends are posting more comments there and stuff, too.

It's all a bit daft, really, but sure where's the harm?

link8r

I think twitter is a very powerful networking tool. I met a group of Limerick based entrepeneurs through it in January which led to Bizcamp Limerick being established - which was a very successful day that resulted in 200+ people attending a one-day seminar at UL for people who want to open their own business.

That's just one example of many I have. Its like being able to share ideas, information and network (socially and/or for business) with people you probably just wouldn't get to meet otherwise or would have to travel to meet.

I think the cliche that people just update what bodily function they've just expressed is so very exaggerated - and mostly by people who don't use twitter.

The 140 Character limit is clever - it's good for preventing long drawn out soap box speeches! It's not a SMS style service - so the comparison there is just pointless.

George St John

LadyDee "Im doing a college thesis on social networking sites" Please see GHQ.com for some research results.

mick.fr

I find Twitter being pretty useless.
I have an account in there for a few months, my page gets my blog updates, but my updates are no where to be found on Google. My page is not indexed at all.
I was hoping to get some additional backlinks with Twitter, but it is a lost cause.
Anyway people use my RSS feed, so I see no point in Twitter.

StaticNoise

I'm a prominent Irish Twitterer and I use it frequently.
It's very much used by businessmen and media... But that's all I'll say!

Mantel

Twitter is handy for confusing the yanks, the bludget thing awhile ago had them confused for awhile when it stormed up the trending topics chart.

A few sites like the dell outlet store, komplett, blacknight and elara put offers up there so it's handy that way. I'm not much of a talker so I haven't found it a big thing to use to communicate to people, there are tons of bots though. I followed someone that I thought might be intresting and I get an DM straight back thanking me for the follow and to checkout a money making scam "That really works!" Yeah, great. BLOCK!

LoonyLovegood

I've been on bebo about 3 years now, but I don't like it that much any more, it's full of spam. I'm on facebook now, and I much prefer it. The privacy settings on facebook are an awful lot better than bebo's, anyway.

I've been tweeting since March, and love it. I have a lot of friends in the US/Canada, and they all use it. It's handy for keeping in touch with all them. I also use it for my podcast and for my website, because it keeps people in the know, especially with the website building that's been going on the last few weeks.

loveissucide

Used to use Bebo,was good initially but it's ultimately banjaxed since knackers, spammer, kids and paedophiles took it over.Deleted it and have had no inclination for a new one.Switched to Facebook, a lot easier to use and a better job overall.Twitter is a waste of space.MySpace is more suited to bands than individual people IMO.

1huge1

SirDarren wrote: »

Yeah, "eventually".

Most of the Irish seem to be so behind when it comes to the internet and social networks.

I mean, I was using Twitter in early 2007.

And most Irish people are only joining Twitter now, and not even using it fully still.

And by the time they finally start using regularly, the rest of the world will have moved onto the next eCraze.

I think its thanks to the likes of Bebo that so many young Irish people got online so I welcome them.

I joined bebo in late 2005 and only in the last few months have converted over to facebook, In saying that I haven't used my bebo a/c in a long time.

STBR

1huge1 wrote: »

I think its thanks to the likes of Bebo that so many young Irish people got online so I welcome them.

I joined bebo in late 2005 and only in the last few months have converted over to facebook, In saying that I haven't used my bebo a/c in a long time.

See, this is exactly my point about the Irish people being behind.

I was using Facebook before you were even using Bebo.

rikerdonegal

I have a peripheral interest in Bebo and Facebook (but I'm really loving twitter I must admit).

I started to use Bebo because some sisters/brothers/friends were using it. They were mad into it this time last year and so I pitched in. But they've all lost interest now, and Facebook has kinda pulled my interest instead. But in a mild way. I check it because people make comments under my twitter tweets and I get an email and - in response to that - I visit FB. Once there's no reason to go there (nothing to reply to) I can't imagine I'll bother.

Twitter, however, is becoming a 'thing' with me. It's fun and - I'm rapidly learning - useful, too. It's easier than FB and requires no effort really.

Something that requires no effort? Always a good thing

jill_valentine

Bebo/Facebook and Twitter serve totally different functions though, I don't think they can necessarily be compared.

Bebo/Facebook are all about the individual, the beauty of Twitter is that it doesn't really allow you to run away with your ego to the same extent. What makes it interesting is the collective conversation. It's hard to see the value in it from the outside, it's not until you're following and replying to at least 30 or 40 people that the glory of it becomes apparent.