Yeah, I'm a twitterer, a tweeter. I'm a twit. I tweet.¹ My friends who don't (yet) tweet or don't understand the whole thing can just deal with it.
I signed up for twitter a while back, checked in from time to time, and didn't find it compelling. As a result I didn't use twitter for a long time, but then it seemed to reach some sort of critical mass and became interesting to me. (There are many parallels with Google Wave; Wave most definitely isn't interesting right now.)
Anyway, on twitter I can categorize the people I interact with as a group of Bangaloreans, a group of Sinophiles, some cyclists and a group of infosec-related folks. These are the ones I "hang" with.
Now take twitter to India. In India, there is this amazing cult of celebrity. Moreso than even the US, people here dig their superstars. Unlike the US, Indians focus their attention. At any one time, there is really only a handful of true superstars who command the vast majority of the attention.
Enter Shashi Tharoor. Look him up in wikipedia if you need to.
He recently made news for tweeting a joke about riding "cattle class" on an airplane. When translated into India's dozens of official languages, this side-comment in English took the form of a serious insult to some folks who didn't get the translation just right. Remember this is a country where the cow is revered and worshiped (by Hindus anyway).
Anyway, Shashi Tharoor is one of India's first famous tweeters. The fact that he's also in a serious governmental position (minister for external affairs, sort of like the US Secretary of State or the British Foreign Secretary) makes his tweeting quite interesting. He talks about all the other heads of state he meets, the places he's seen, and sometimes comments on local Indian politics as well.
He agreed recently to a "tweetup" -- essentially a meeting of twitter users.
I was really pleasantly surprised to find the event
It was so motivating to spend about 90 minutes with this "superstar" of Indian politics. It was like a book reading or a Q/A session -- well done.
So "chapeau" to my buddy @dhempe (known to most as Hrish Thota) for the idea and the organization.
1) Sidenote rant: These words "twitter", "tweet", "tweetup", etc. are so painful for me to type. It's almost as bad as "u", "ur", and the bane of Indian IT workers "gud" & "wud". I hate SMS slang,
refuse to use it and think that anyone who does use it is a complete
bloody moron. Really, dear readers, if you use the word "gud" or "wud", the educated "rest of the world" sees you as a complete idiot. Tweet-words, however, somehow have become "normal".
I signed up for twitter a while back, checked in from time to time, and didn't find it compelling. As a result I didn't use twitter for a long time, but then it seemed to reach some sort of critical mass and became interesting to me. (There are many parallels with Google Wave; Wave most definitely isn't interesting right now.)
Anyway, on twitter I can categorize the people I interact with as a group of Bangaloreans, a group of Sinophiles, some cyclists and a group of infosec-related folks. These are the ones I "hang" with.
Now take twitter to India. In India, there is this amazing cult of celebrity. Moreso than even the US, people here dig their superstars. Unlike the US, Indians focus their attention. At any one time, there is really only a handful of true superstars who command the vast majority of the attention.
Enter Shashi Tharoor. Look him up in wikipedia if you need to.
He recently made news for tweeting a joke about riding "cattle class" on an airplane. When translated into India's dozens of official languages, this side-comment in English took the form of a serious insult to some folks who didn't get the translation just right. Remember this is a country where the cow is revered and worshiped (by Hindus anyway).
Anyway, Shashi Tharoor is one of India's first famous tweeters. The fact that he's also in a serious governmental position (minister for external affairs, sort of like the US Secretary of State or the British Foreign Secretary) makes his tweeting quite interesting. He talks about all the other heads of state he meets, the places he's seen, and sometimes comments on local Indian politics as well.
He agreed recently to a "tweetup" -- essentially a meeting of twitter users.
I was really pleasantly surprised to find the event
- well-behaved
- well-organized
- comfortable
- pleasant
It was so motivating to spend about 90 minutes with this "superstar" of Indian politics. It was like a book reading or a Q/A session -- well done.
So "chapeau" to my buddy @dhempe (known to most as Hrish Thota) for the idea and the organization.
1) Side
refuse to use it and think that anyone who does use it is a complete
bloody moron. Really, dear readers, if you use the word "gud" or "wud", the educated "rest of the world" sees you as a complete idiot. Tweet-words, however, somehow have become "normal".
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