Microblogging is a form of blogging based on short posts. A real-time communication platform, microblogs are short, tight snippets of information that tell others what you’re doing, where you’re going or even how you’re feeling at any given moment.
In a social context, you could essentially be keeping tabs on your friends’ activities and vice versa, within a private group or publicly on the Web. Several microblogging services are available: we’re featuring two popular ones in this post.
Twitter is a networked web and mobile phone based shared short messaging system. It allows users to write brief text updates (max 140 characters) and publish them, either to be viewed by anyone or by a restricted group which can be chosen by the user. These messages can be submitted by a variety of means, including text messaging, instant messaging, e-mail, MP3 or the Web (source).
You can open a free account at twitter.com.
Yammer is a similar tool for organizations, that allows quick networking and information sharing, with the added benefit of connecting easily within the common organization email domain (i.e. cgiar.org). Note: if you have a valid @cgiar.org email address, sign up to join the growing cgiar network on Yammer.
How can you use microblogging to your advantage?
Having started out as a “What are you doing now?” social communication tool, microblogging holds great potential at work. Whether you see it as an annoying distraction or powerful communication tool, it is in the hands of the user, you.
Here’s why you should consider using microblogging at work:
- Brevity. First, the 140 character limit on your microblog forces you to scale down your update to just the facts. Post an idea, a useful link*, ask for quick feedback all in less than a minute. This works in your favor because the responses are just as brief and to the point. (*Last week I mentioned learning about tinyurl.com. TinyURL is an excellent tool that helps you shrink a long url into a tiny one which you can then share with others via Twitter, Yammer or other instant messengers).
- As an informal communication tool
- Announcements to promote events/ activities
- Asking for quick feedback and posting short updates create an informal structure that gets your point across without getting bogged down by more formal means of communications.
- Updates from colleagues you ‘follow’. This feature is really the crux of microblogging. Whom you follow determines the type of updates you gain access to. By intelligently selecting the right people, you are now privy to their experiences, ideas and insights. You have the potential to ‘mine’ their resources as your followers ‘mine’ yours. What are the benefits?
- You get breaking news. Real time conversations can be very revealing.
- Networking is easier. The informal setting allows quick introductions and gets you straight onto their microblogs.
- Connect within a community at work, increase visibility and engage with partners and colleagues.
- Less email. Microblogging on Twitter or Yammer reduces the need for email exchanges, which help de-clutter your inbox. The versatility in sharing your messages through a variety of ways reduces the dependency on email access.
- Real-time sharing during events (e.g. conferences, training events, meetings). It is one of the key tools for social reporting, i.e. “is where a group of participants at an event interactively and jointly contribute to some form of reporting, in text, photos, images or video. The resulting “social report” is made accessible, usually online, as soon as possible, sometimes as a half-product. This allows others to join in, to extend, to adjust or remix.” (explore the ‘social reporting’ tag on this blog). Microblogging during events increases visibility and outreach of the knowledge that is generated at a rapid pace during face-to-face meetings, and it helps build a level of engagement and participation that goes beyond physical presence.
How to be a ‘savvy’ microblogger
- Post updates that add value. This could be an idea, interesting links and shortcuts that have appeal but do not warrant a blog post.
- Respond to microblogs when you have a contribution to make. You don’t have to interact on all posts that are shared.
- Exercise caution when posting updates. In a more public group, you may want to hold back on personal details.
- Choose whom you ‘follow’ wisely
Who’s been microblogging
- Conference share and “back channel.” In the recent ShareFair in Rome, several participants twittered live and during the sessions to share insights and highlights with their twitter networks. Current example? Colleagues are now twitting live from the African Geospatial Week in Nairobi (with special postings on the Yammer cgiar network).
- Incorporation of Twitter in CIMMYT’s blog. The ICT-KM blog (where you are now) incorporates the Twitter updates on the sidebar.
- Media giants like BBC and The New York Times use Twitter to post headlines and story links (NYT and BBC)
Have you had any experience you’d like to share about microblogging? Perhaps you’ve identified other uses for microblogging at work. We would love to hear from you.
Till next week!
Resources
- See the KS Toolkit Microblogging article for more information with some cool links to “how to” guides and hands-on experience reports;
- What about twitter in enterprise? A blog post by Brett Young
- How to Present While People are Twittering A blog post by Tamar Weinberg
- Enterprise Microsharing Reading List | Pistachio Consulting
- Why microblogging might prove a good fit for aid agencies | Aid Worker Daily
- Micro communications for your business with Yammer | Introspection
Get these links and more from the microblogging tag at CGXchange on Del.icio.us
April 2, 2009 at 3:53 pm
Great post Meena. Nancy White just shared an interesting related link on the KM4Dev list: http://libraryclips.blogsome.com/2009/04/01/social-search-help-engines-and-sense-making/
April 3, 2009 at 1:39 pm
Hi Meena,
Excellent post on explaining Microblogging!
I have been using Twitter just over half a year and love it. I have discovered people with similar interests, sites, tools etc. There are several tools that one can use with Twitter. I have tried Twhirl and TweetDeck (desktop tools) as well as Firefox plug-in TwitterFox.
In case of Yammer, I am just starting to experiment with it. I am also using YammerFox as a plug-in for Firefox.
Keep up the good work! Looking forward to the next post!
Gauri
April 4, 2009 at 12:40 pm
Excellent post Meena. I ma leaving Nairobi after the first ever Africa Geospatial Agriculture week, and since starting the week, a number of participants started to twitter and loved it. The potentials are enormous and people can see them! CHeck us out at http://www.twitter.com/ictkm
April 7, 2009 at 5:07 am
Thanks for this heads-up Meena.
Things move so fast in the Blogsphere, I can’t really be sure how tech-savvy or up-to-date I am in these things anymore!
;p
April 8, 2009 at 3:13 am
Thanks for this Meena. I’m really curious about Twitter…but afraid that, like so many of these social networking tools, it may become addictive…! This might be the push I need to go and see how I could tap into some of the benefits of microblogging. Looking forward to your next post.
April 8, 2009 at 8:01 am
Thanks for your comments. Am feeling very encouraged here. Looking at the link Simone sent, I’m drawn to what was said about the power of Twitter: “People do have an altruistic nature in Twitter, but it’s human nature that we will help out others that we know will help us out in the future…a lot of this has got to do with the limited time we have in a day…” Any thoughts?
June 7, 2009 at 11:01 am
Really nice post! Inspired me to write another one about how organizations can use Twitter:
Micro-blogging: 140 characters of gossip or added value for development organizations?
http://www.web2fordev.net/component/content/article/1-latest-news/68-micro-blogging
June 8, 2009 at 9:02 am
Thank you, Christian.
And thanks also for your post on micro-blogging adding value for development organizations. Enjoyed reading it 🙂
June 14, 2009 at 9:12 am
Hi Meena,
I’m rediscovering this excellent series you wrote about social media. 😉
You might also mention identi.ca and the open source version laconi.ca …
The latter allows you to start a microblogging network on your Intranet so people feel more free to express their opinions and exchange info, without the outside world peeping in.
Laconi.ca is pretty easy to set up and to administrate. See this post on what we did: http://blog.wfplogistics.org/cipcip-it-is-not-what-you-do-but-who-you-do-it-with/
What I have found is to institutionalize early on some form of broad discipline to distinguish the functions of microblogging, Skype and Email, to avoid the fear of ‘oh God yet another source of information I HAVE to check’.. Specifically in the functions of direct messaging and replies, there is an overlap with Skype and Email.
Microblogging should be seen as optional, an added value, “to check when I feel like it”, but can not become a “must”.
As I write this, I am following the role of Twitter in the post-election upraising in Iran. It seems like “The next revolution will be Twittered”
June 15, 2009 at 8:52 am
Hi Peter,
Thanks for your kind words.
I heard about Laconi.co at WFP from Jon Thompson at the ICT-KM social media workshop. And reading your post drives the point that microblogging has real use in real situations (vivid scenario, btw), and it’s not just a play thing for teenagers.
And I agree completely – use microblogging to add value, and not just because it’s there.