The following is a very quick guide to joining this discussion.

What is Twitter?

It’s a way to exchange information and talk to millions of people all over the world.

Twitter is NOT Facebook style updates of what you are doing every few minutes!

How do I join?

Get an account here.

Hint: Choose an ID that is as short as possible!

Hint: Avoid using all capital letters, underscores & pseudonym’s

Hint: Load your personal photo  immediately! No photo is the true mark of a noob (newbie) . If you are shy, a cartoon or logo will do.

Hint: Fill in your profile so people know a bit about you.

Order: Do NOT protect your updates. You will never get to experience the real Twitter if you do.

OK so I have an account, now what?

Stop using Twitter!

Virtually nobody actually uses the Twitter website to follow Twitter. There are many better alternatives.

For new users, I highly recommend TwitZap.com. It’s a Twitter interface that is easy on the eyes and is intuitive.

Just login with your Twitter ID…

OK I’m in. So how?

 
1. Tweet!
Send a message, 140 characters or less, to announce yourself to the world:

“Hello Twitterverse!”

Remember: everyone in the world can see your message if they bother to look for it. Do not tweet your e-mail address, phone number or IC! Duh.

Follow weareaware on Twitter!

2. Follow someone!
When you follow someone you see their updates. However they will not see yours unless they follow you. It’s not automatically mutual.

Already have friends on Twitter? Follow them.

You can follow anyone you want. It’s not like Facebook – you do not need to know a person to follow them. Just follow anyone you think is interesting. Your list of follows and followers will grow slowly over time.

3. Follow a conversation using hashtags!
When a group of people discuss a given topic, they use a key word that can be used as a common search term. The keyword is called a hashtag and starts with a hash # sign.

Talk about AWARE Singapore and related topics is marked with #awaresg (see recent #awaresg tweets above). Type #awaresg into your Twitzap search field in called add a channel. You are now following the conversation.

For an even richer experience of the buzz, there are lots of great sites devoted to following hashtagged conversations:

Twazzup | Twubs | Twendz | Twitterfall | Twitter Search

Final Words

Health Warning:
It takes a while to "get" Twitter but once you do, it can be highly addictive.

Who said what to whom?
One thing most twitter clients do VERY poorly is showing threaded conversation ie so that you know WHAT tweet is being replied to. If you get confused, try looking at the tweets through Tweetree, another web-based interface.

DMs:
You can send DMs (Direct Messages) to anyone that you follow and who follows you back. These are private messages. You cannot DM someone who does not follow you.

@:
The @ symbol is used when you want to reply or refer to a particular user. To reply to someone place the @ symbol before their username.

RT:
RT stands for Re-tweet. It is proper twitter etiquette to credit the source with RT @username then their message.

That’s it! You are not a noob anymore.

 
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