The Daily Troopers

Twitter is a fertile link farm filled with digital data trails of goodness (depending on who you follow). Right before the Facebook/FriendFeed story broke on Twitter, which was repeated and retweeted constantly so that it ceased to be news and became a slow and painful stutter, a few tweets started rolling in about Storm Troopers.

Being the Scifi geek that I am, I immediately clicked and found myself on Stéfan's Flickr page, and discovered his daily Stormtrooper 365 project that started on April 3rd 2009.

The photographs - composition, lighting, scenario, props - are really funny and very well done. I subscribed to the feed. This is the kind of engaging and comedic project that can catch fire for its creativity, humor and artistic execution...

Less is more?

I know - not another blog entry about Twitter. But there is yet another development in the user-generated evolution of Twitter.

How much can be packed in 140 characters? How can meaning be embedded in the short and sweet? Did Mark Twain capture it best when he said: “I didn't have time to write a short letter, so I wrote a long one instead"?

How is the web shaping the way we communicate? Are we witnessing the rise of a new breed of multi-taskers with short-attention spans that seek instant gratification? Could be an interesting bunch.

Snapshot of Twitter recipes, book and love story below.

Twitter Recipes:
Saffron Asparagus Orzo: brwn c orzo/T butter/garlic; +.25t saffron&s+p/2.5c broth. Cvr@low9m; +2c asparagus3m. Fold+8T parmesan. Srv w parm.

Look closely. These are awesome acts of compression. Ingredients, actions, quantities, times and temperatures — both Fahrenheit and Celsius — boiled down to utmost richness, density and clarity. A dish, a meal, a trip to deliciousness magically packed into the tiniest carry-on bag.

"I do this as a coffee-break hobby,” Maureen Evans said. “Kind of like sudoku. I really get a kick out of how complex a recipe I can fit into 140 characters.” The recipes are from her collection of cookbooks and her travels. “They’re solutions to what’s fresh and what’s in season.”

Unpacking tweets for an hour or so in the kitchen is surprisingly challenging. It forces the mind to think harder, to fill gaps, to innovate and improvise. It re-introduces risk and discovery to cooking, which puts you only a short distance from delight.

You’ll find @Maureen at twitter.com/cookbook.

Read more here.

Book: Twitter Wit
Former Gawker writer Nick Douglas made a stir when his book-in-progress called Twitter Wit, a humorous collection of tweets, got picked up by HarperCollins for a pretty penny ($50K). Suddenly a publishing phenomenon that had been happening sporadically in the blogosphere had a new Web 2.0 focus: Twitter.

Read more here.

Digi-love?
Throughout history, many love affairs have been chronicled through poetry, letters and song. In the future, we will have tracks of Twitters to detail the emotional wealth of modern day people, as told in fewer than 140 characters.


What are you condensing into 140 characters?

Hard candy rocks...

Well the sweet buzz has certainly been rippling across the web after Skittles turned its site into a social media channel, revealing conversations happening on Twitter, with a rotating landing page that will point visitors to information about the brand on consumer-generated media sites such as Facebook, Flickr, YouTube and Wikipedia).

This is a bold foray into consumer-constructed branding in the social media space (people have been building brand value for years but this is the first time a consumer-facing brand has loosened the reins to this extent in the digital arena).

Perhaps this is exactly the move this magical, young, and adventurous brand should make to stay relevant amongst its core demographic. But how will Skittles further spur the excitement and conversation after the initial buzz dies down? How will it help keep the dialogue alive? Hummm...a brief I'd love to have.

Interesting times. We'll see whether this tactic bolsters the bottom line for Skittles, whether it comes to sales or brand equity, but it feels like the right experimental approach that can work in this space (I'll be watching it;).

Although this Tweet was quite amusing (I suppose Skittles is open to it and the vast array of other profane uses for Skittles). Indeed tweets like this may add more fuel to the chat fire.

Next up: Facebook becomes the new home page...

Information or personal?

I was speaking to a prospective client about Twitter. He recently unfollowed a bunch of folks because he thought they filled his page with random useless information, from inner thoughts to constant life updates. He doesn't see the value in this exchange, but rather prefers to follow people that share information about the world, technology, or his field. That got me thinking. I actually like a blend of the two. Sometimes I enjoy the personal flavor of Twitter, hearing about how people feel about Thursday mornings, or what motivates them to eat a cheese and bacon sandwich, and of course I discover all sorts of interesting information that I wouldn't find anywhere else. Twitter helps organize and flag some of the most interesting topics, discussions, events going on both off and online. But I still like the medicine cabinet feel of Twitter as well.

Another conversation with someone in the Advertising industry was quite different, although this related to blogging. He basically expressed blog fatigue when it came to people pontificating about how much they know, a type of web-posturing I suppose. He loved the personal life-story element of blogging, and felt turned off by cold peacock parade of knowledge.

I spoke to my partner about this. I suppose I was wondering if I had something valuable to add, or how to achieve the balance between sharing info and sharing bits about my life (but hey I really may not be that interesting;). He responded that I blogged to share, not just to enter a one-way dialogue (otherwise why put it out there?). Perhaps whether someone reads it or not is another story. I need to build my connections, comment on people's blogs, refine my own writing, my own stories, my own information. To strike the right balance between the informative and personal (which can border on the mundane).

What do you think? Why do you blog?

Huffin' & Puffin'

But the house ain't going anywhere and you can't just push yourself in.

I read an article on Advertising Age about how advertisers could capitalize on the Twitter phenomenon by turning it into an Ad network. Now without going into great detail about the article (all explained here) and not repeating some of the very astute and perceptive comments about the piece, it got me thinking about brands and organizations that get it right.

I think a large part of understanding this space comes from your participation in it, which in turn determines your approach to Twitter. If you enter the community with a 'quick wins, quick returns' mindset, you will ultimately fail. Because it's not about pushing messages (however short) out without a fundamental understanding of what value you could add - what are you giving people that makes you an active and appreciated member of this community?

Some people may actually want to 'hear' a more personal side of a brand as well as get relevant and interesting information - airlines, media companies, and museums are great Twitter examples of this (Jetblue provides people with updates and answers to various travel-related questions while also giving people a feel for the brand; and the Getty Museum gives people updates about their collections and other items that would be important to art lovers).

So rather than focusing on transforming Twitter into an Ad network, and what could be gained from Tweeters, they think about what they could add or give, which is reflected by the quality and sometimes quantity of their followers and the community that forms around their product, service or organization.

I personally think that some brands could make interesting use of Twitter. I'd like to know what's going on at Whole Foods - sales, new products, etc., and would gladly follow if they provided that kind of information, but not as a medium to push out contrived brand messages to attempt to convert me into a Whole Foodie.

What do you think? Do you follow a brand? Would you follow a brand? Why? Which one?