one small footprint

found in five

Okay, maybe ten minutes is more spot-on, but I adore alliteration.

Here's what I discovered, read, tagged (and magically shared) in a sixth of an hour on Twitter:

The Happiness Index - Thank you, Scott McLeod, for sharing. This article confirms a recent assertion that using adjectives is a tough endeavor.

Girl Talk Radio - Kudos to you, Kevin Jarrett, for opening up your blog to the world.

College Cost Calculator - Expressions of gratitude bestowed upon you, Richard Byrne, for allowing me to cry, four-fold, over the impending money suck investment for the education of my four children

Lullabies for Elmo - Much obliged, Guy Kawasaki, for overloading my tweet stream with links and links and links.

So, in the most simple manner I can muster, I still marvel over resistance to using a resource like Twitter.

contactable

alternately entitled, 'trees of bandwidth'

Everyone began exchanging business cards, and everyone handed me one, like a present, but flat, unwrapped, quaint and rectangular.

I had no card to give. I have no card to give. No card to give!

So I gave them all that I could gather:

my Twitter username

hello faculty,

There is now a Twitter (stop laughing) feed on our district home page (why are you still laughing?).

Let's share good news via this wondrous service. To do so, email me any delectable tid-bits and I will add said updates to the Twitter (really? still?) stream (now you're just being immature).

Don't know what to Tweet? Here are some examples:

Good Tweet: Suzy Studentberg took 1st place in the District One Cross Country meet.

Bad Tweet: I ran over a squirrel. Twice.

Again, any good news that you would like 'tweeted', let me know.

any(one) can tweet

Sitting at lunch, sodium pretending to be 'soup', Joyce and I talking about Sesame Street turning forty. And since we've already limited our conversations to 140 characters a piece, we're now discussing Twitter. And Sesame Street.

What would Cookie Monster tweet?
"Cookie 'sometimes food'? Sometime this! Myum-myum, myum-myum!"

What would Elmo tweet?
"Mr. Noodle creepy to Elmo. Keep window shade down from now on."

What would Ernie tweet?
"@Bert. Thank goodness for twin beds."

Like Historical Tweets, I think that asking students to create tweets for the Sesame Street gang would be a quick, engaging activity, perfect for our creative writing cour -

Maybe we have bigger issues than access to micro-blogging platforms.

relationships, tricky

Okay, so in the two years I've been on Twitter, I've experienced more relationship fluctuation (read: 'followers' and 'qwitters') than the whole course of my Twitterless life.

Normally, the loss of a friend is followed by some period of emotional mourning:

Why? Please, let me make it up to you!

or an anger-infused binge of self-justification:

I'm better off without that pebble-chucking misanthrope anyhow!

But with Twitter, the celerity in which I've seen followers come and go leaves no time for reflection. And I have no desire to find out why people 'qwit', and even less need to mend any severed connections.

I guess that's the real power of Twitter.

a tweally twifficult twest

The future of education depends on your mastery of this.


I'm constantly reminded why I despise multiple-choice tests.

dear facebook person,

So I'm not sure where I left off, but I've been at Springfield HS for over a decade (gasp!), I have four kids (gasp!) all four and under, and I don't think I would change much.

I live outside of Philly, no different than any other year of my life, except my wonderful home is a twin, and I live in a town where people hang NASCAR flags.

My own property remains flagless.

Writing messages in Facebook is tricky for me b/c I'm looking at all the 'I's in this message, and shame is washing over me. Maybe it's because I think that my blog is my all about me place.

And then there's Twitter.

I'm going through some sort of tech crisis, and to make matters worse, the anchor on the local news just directed viewers to look at his blog.

And now there's a story about Twitter!

On Facebook, we can write as much as we want. On Twitter, we're limited to 140 characters. There's something dystopian about all of this, as I think the next app will, in true Orwellian style, truncate our language even more.

They'll release Sputr, and we'll be limited to 100 characters.

Then, in about a year, KerTale will invite us to express ourselves in 70 characters.

And the eradication of our text-based communication will be complete in 2011 when our 6" Dell Mini computers come equipped with a direct link to '?'

And the question won't be 'what are you doing?', but 'what can you say?' in four words.

of choices 2.0

Quick:

You are leaving. You are never coming back. You are allowed to bring your laptop. You are guaranteed enduring internet connectivity, BUT...

The Devout Network Administrators (DNA, which when you think about it, is both creepy and telling) will only provide/grant/unblock access to one social networking app,tool,thingy.

with or without you

Goodbye,'Whopper Sacrifice'.

What do you mean? Where am I going?

Haven't you heard? You've been dropped, or as some of the less clever have noted, 'sacrificed'.

But why? I'm a social-media marketers dream. What has Wendy's done to pump brand awareness? How about McDona--

Are you serious?

Fine. Look, there's no danger if I'm around. If anything, I've given Facebook users the chance to think about their beloved 'friends'. It's a heavy term, 'friend', and in truth, it shouldn't be deemed a collectible.

You're still outta here. And I can't help but notice some hostility in your voice.

What hostility? You're being ridiculous. Hey, I've seen your page. Three hundred friends? You don't have three hundred friends. I gave people an out, a way to refine their use and practice of the term 'friend'. What have you added to the social fabric?

Again, hostility. I think it eats you up --

Ha ha, that's funny.

--that people dropped their friends just to get a coupon for you. And in the meantime, how many friends do you have on Facebook? Twitter? You're alone. You've been alone. Your company dangled you out like bait. You're nothing more than a digitized bait-and-switch, a gastro-intestinal rope-a-dope.

Oh really? Well guess what? Sounds like you're talking about yourself and everyone like you. My company played you, no, fed you, words and whoppers, and you chomped at all of it. Empty words. Empty calories. And now, you'll just go back to empty friends. Have a nice life.

Well...I...but...you...I know! I'll follow you on Twitter if you follow me.

Really?

Really.

where's the 'plus' ?

Once a 'B' student, always a 'B' student:



And yet another reason why people around me scoff ridicule condemn Twitter.