No longer Tweeting about (just) me

When Twitter first started, the question was “What are you doing? (reply in 140 characters or less)”

Many took the question literally. So there were a lot of people writing short posts that were like short snippets of their diary. “Going to the movies” or “Meeting with bff” are examples of common Tweets that are literal answers to the question.

But like all tools, people began to see that Twitter could be more than a chronicle of one’s daily events. It was more than an outlet of raves and rants. Twitter users started to find innovative ways of communicating, even creating their own “utilities” such as hashtags and retweets. For many, Twitter became an important source of information, like a newsfeed where one could subscribe to a number of news providers. This prompted many legacy news organizations as well as bloggers, corporate PR and anyone who wanted their information out there to join Twitter.

Twitter also proved to be handy in crowdsourcing information, a live citizen news feed for the Mumbai terrorist attacks (although it also played a part in actually helping the terrorists) and also a place to publicly share emotions and opinions, like for the death of Michael Jackson.

Now, Twitter’s question reads: “What’s happening?” It is not specific to the user’s experience, and although one could certainly keep talking about personal things, this seems to signal a shift in micro-blogging culture– a shift from “me” to “us.” How will this affect status updates? Will we see a trend in less self-related Tweets? How much does the official question affect what people write? What new ways will we see users repurpose Twitter for yet another communicative purpose? The question posed in Facebook’s status update is “What’s on your mind?” reflecting Twitter’s initial question about the individual. If the microblogging trend is going towards collective information, then perhaps Facebook will soon change its question too.

Facebook is slow in developing microtransactions content

Facebook announced that it is now selling music; a move that I believe took extremely long, given that music was a huge driving force for Myspace and Cyworld. I sometimes don’t understand why Facebook is slow in adopting business models that have already been proven in other markets. For instance, it kind of lost the virtual room model to Zynga (although I suppose if Facebook were to adopt its own virtual room thing it would squash Zynga) a business model fueled by micro transactions. I also don’t know why it hasn’t adopted the micro transactions model for customizable fonts and customizable skins. Since self-representation is such an important factor of social network sites, it only seems to make sense that such elements be hugely popular. Fonts and skins are extremely easy and cheap to produce; these elements may not be adopted by older users but younger users (and perhaps middle-aged women) will definitely be interested.

In a sense, Facebook has it easy because it can adopt business models that have been successful with Cyworld, which is a few years older and only popular in Korea and a couple other asian countries. If that is so, I wouldn’t be surprised to see Facebook adding more microtransaction content (like fonts, skins), and introducing services that make it a one-stop browser, which would include adding self-accounting services, subscribing to news, and becoming kind of like iGoogle.

It would also be super cool if Facebook could work with Amazon to put the universal wish list into Facebook so that you can send your friends gifts without having to know their addresses. FB is actually perfect for weddings if there was a wedding app that lets you invite your friends, put up your registry, share photos, etc. (There probably already is one) Would be nice if that could be in place before I get married, hehehe.

Are Digital brats are middle aged?

I am beginning to notice that the digital brat phenomena is not so prevalent among younger users of technology. In fact, not only are young people more adept at using technology, they also have better etiquette. For instance, younger people tend not to speak so loudly on their cell phones in public or use loud ring tones. Another example is the young girl who was texting while making a video call on her mobile phone because she didn’t want to be obtrusive (I wrote about this a couple years ago). I think this is extremely interesting because the etiquette that the young people develop are not from education, but developed amongst themselves.

This isn’t something that one can generalize, especially because the people that I know are brats are also those who have huge egos; so maybe it’s more of an ego issue than an age issue. Maybe it’s because I haven’t gone into a high school classroom where all the kids are texting each other instead of listening to the teacher. But to some extent, I have the feeling that the so-called middle aged early adapters are more “noisy” about their use because they’re unconsciously flaunting it, whereas younger people take the new technology for granted so it’s not so much of a big deal.

Cosplay at Anime Boston 2009

Just posted article on Cosplay at Playaslife.com…also posted photos on flickr.

Youngest cosplayer: 4 months old