Modern News

You just joined Twitter. Now what? Someone asked me this earlier today

At first twitter can be very confusing. The conversations go fast and using your twitter page makes it almost impossible to follow conversations, at least when you start getting a good amount of followers. So what do you do???

My first advice is to get a Twitter Desktop application. These make it easier to follow the conversation and also certain topics. I use Tweetdeck, which also allows you to create groups of twitterers to follow. Also there are many useful applications on cell phones to use twitter also. I use Twittberry on my Blackberry Pearl.

But there are many good applications for computers and phones out there. You can go here to find some others out there. Tweetdeck and Tweetberry might not work best for you, but I advise to find one that is.

After all that is done, and you can follow the conversations better, what is next??? Twitter is used for many different reasons, just as there are many different applications for Twitter. I use it to get my message out for my blog and political activism. I use Twitoaster as a way to tweet all my posts at my blog. But there are many different plugins and applications for all the diffferent blogging platforms. Tweetmeme is also a very popular one for Word Press blogs. But there are many more that you can use.

But what if I do not have a blog and I am not politically active. Well, as with the World Wide Web, there are as many types of conversations that you can choose. Some people want to know what is going on in celebrity gossip, then you can follow @TMZ or some other celebrity oriented tweeter.

Still others use it for business purposes. Almost all the major corporations and businesses have Twitter accounts now. If you want to know what is going on with the iPhone, you can follow the #iPhone hashtag.

Now what is a hashtag??? A Hashtag is an easy way for people to follow a conversation. If you want to know what the GOP is doing, you can follow the #GOP hashtag. If you want to follow what is going on at 73 Wire, then you can follow the hashtag #73wire. Here is a directory of hashtags. Also if you want to follow the people at Red State you can follow the #RS hashtag. Some may not be on the list though.

Twitter is a very effective tool for whatever you want it to be. Political activism, celebrity gossip, news, sports and pretty much anything you can think up.

I hope this is a useful way to get use to twitter. I am sure that I left some things out and could add a whole weeks worth of posts just about Twitter and all the uses and applications for Twitter. But I wanted to make this a pretty simple way to explain what Twitter is and how to follow a conversation on Twitter. It can be intimidating at first, but once you get the hang if it, it is a fun way to see what is going on in the world.

#RS added for my friends at Red State

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