Who is @RealtorTed? Who is @jkrums. Well if you have heard of twitter or have never heard of twitter, it is a way that is rapidly changing communication and the spread of news.
Not everything posted on twitter can be taken as fact but coupled with pictures, the news of the day is reaching the Twittersphere long before traditional media can get the story out.
Last year a UC Berkeley student was in Egypt, who was caught up in a demonstration and taken to jail. His tweets through twitter transmitted from his cell phone were picked up by other twitter followers and help was orchestrated from California immediately.
Today’s plane crash in the Hudson river was no exception. A Ferry in the river was en-route to the site and the picture below was taken by twitter user @jkrums in real time. @jkrums using his iPhone camera and text messaging, uploaded the dramatic picture and a message via twitter immediately.
I have been using the service for almost a year now and predominantly use the service to track national discussion about the Real Estate Industry. This service has tremendously helped expand my marketing ideas and other ways to better serve my clients. The other ways I have used twitter is to follow college football games and the elections on election night, at election.twitter.com. Tracking these events is easy at search.twitter.com. These searches can be even more powerful though the use of hashtags . I can watch those programs on TV and armed with my laptop I can follow the national discussion taking place on these hot topics.
One last use that has been an interesting development is, many of the conferences I attend are finding twitter users commentating on panel discussions and keynote speeches as they happen. Other attendees engage in the discussion and comments and those that were unable to attend can follow the action live. This creates a new style of synergy between conference attendees and many introductions to new contacts.
These new high tech services are not only popular and really catching on, but they are providing information at break-neck speed. Traditional media is trying to adapt and incorporate these tools, but it looks like citizen journalism is going to be a big influence on the news we receive.
One last example. When the metrolink train crashed in Chatsworth tragically last year I was in my car on the way back to Simi Valley from Woodland Hills. I was at a stop light updating twitter users over what I had heard about the crash. My typing skills on the phone that day were very poor and the garbled message was picked up KCAL 9 TV news. I was phoned by @richdemuro at KCAL directly within minutes of my message and was asked what I knew about the crash and of I was anywhere near the scene.
News and information is changing rapidly and twitter is a big part of that change.
