I’m currently investigating, by means of current theories of communication, how to locate Twitter between other forms of social and mass communication. There’re some specifics which evolve Twitter (or in general Microblogging, for that matter) into an interesting and unusual new breed of interpersonal and mass communication at once.
Microblogging hasn’t reached a tipping point yet. It’s still mostly an early adopters technology, but fairly recent Nielsen Media numbers (1) suggest that it’s growing rapidly. I’d guess that the ongoing releases of new twitter-based software tools (i.e. Twitterrank) in line with the steep growth of the community will soon burst in an online phenomenon not unlike blogging, but bigger.
Since I plan to build on these thoughts, I decided to present parts of my argumentation here, in order to force myself to critically and elaborately write all these things down which just exist in my head right now.
Thus in my next post, I’ll try to explain why I think that microblogging has more potential than blogging.

(1) Nielsen Media Alert: Fastest Growing Social Networks for September 2008.

The news that New Yorks national debt clock ran out of digits some days ago, due to the increasing national debt, has by now hit every major news and newspaper site. However, I dig the following cynic slashdot-comment regarding the ‘enhancement’ of the clock in order to facilitate the displaying of the necessary digits: 

Mark Shuttleworth, the smart brain behind Thawte and Ubuntu, on the current economic situation:

Economist Kevin Nguyen explains the financial crisis via a Pokémon parable to his 14year old sister. I guess there’s never been an easier example. 

When looking at the current mobile market, I somehow can’t escape the feeling, that there is a certain amount of hypocriticsm around. Judging by press releases, journalistic reviews and user reports, it seems as if people are avoiding a certain part of a topic. Like an illigitimate child not wanting to admit it’s heritage.

This avoidance is the iPhone, or Apple for that matter. Consider the facts: Back when Apple announced the iPhone, there were bold statements from Nokia and the like, claiming they would release similar devices soon. They almost insisted that there was nothing special about the iPhone’s technology. Then, not unlike a flood, a huge amount of iPhone look-a-likes were rushed to the market. They all failed either due to a half-baked operating system, lack of serious applications and sub-par touch technology. Now, almost two years after Apple announced the iPhone, there’s still no ‘iPhone Killer’ around. There’re, however, strong competitors which slowly get there – like the HTC Touch HD or the Blackberry Storm.

The funny thing is, that the whole area of touch-screen phones didn’t even exist prior to the iPhone. Apple basically created a new type of phone, one that, as I’d wager, wouldn’t ever have evolved sans Apple. This is still noticeable, when taking a detailed look at current iPhone competitors. Most include a browser with Pan / Zoom mechanisms, they all include weather or stock widgets, the text entry system has been copied as well. From a abstract perspective, they’re all downright similar to the iPhone, they just vary regarding hardware and interface graphics. This goes as far as the new Blackberry Storm, that seems to have been designed based on the very iPhone interface – at least when you judge by their marketing material.

Now take a closer look at the media surrounding these iPhone-look-alikes. Take for example this review of the HTC Touch HD. The reviewer concludes with the statement, that “HTC just needs to get rid of the Microsoft operating system under the beautiful surface and move to Google Android instead. Then it would probably be the perfect touch-screen mobile phone.” Or browse the countless reviews of other phones. They mostly mention the iPhone as a sort of enfant terrible, reluctantly comparing it to the tested device. And if they compare, the downright biased hope, that the device in question might trump the iPhone, is more than visible.

I think this is due to a very specific problem a lot of these reviewers and users have. They grew up with PC’s, they learned to use Windows by themselves, they’re not only accustomed to the PC world, but they managed to understand it by exploration. It’s like a small secret, one discovered while being on a trip. It might not be big, or beautiful, but there’s a certain amount of proudness involved. These people feel just that way for the Windows and PC world. The old dichotomy between Apple and Microsoft moreover forced them to take sides – Criticizing and even deriding Apple’s decisions.

Now however, there’s a whole industry following Apple. Nokia, HTC, Samsung, Microsoft, Google or Sony. They all copy Apple’s ideas. This leads to a major cognitive dissonance for everyone, who has been busy ignoring Apple in the past. They suddenly can’t but accept, that their old opinions were wrong. But they don’t, they simply blind the iPhone out. Ignoring it.

The sad truth is, that people still act as if the iPhone is nothing special, while intensively copying the iPhone and it’s applications behind their backs. And this results in situations, where people buy  hardware (like HTC Diamond) because they ignore to admit that the iPhone is not only better, but actually the parent, or even very archetype of their device.

Some decisions that have been made poorly, also rallying against and we’ve got to remember what the desire is in this nation at this time.

Astonishing, just how close to the real one it is.

(via Big Contrarian)

As you can see, I just got my iPhone today. Software version is, due to Carrier-Reasons still at 1.0.2, and I plan to keep it that way for some time.
First impression is: Awesome. Absolutely awesome and amazing.
Although it lacks some of the features which I would take for granted in modern Mobile Phones, it shines on many other feature-comparisons.
I’ll write more soon.

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Back when I was young, I loved the Guinness Book of Records. Not only
was it interesting to read what kind of records people had been working
on, there was a lot of fact information too. Longest bridge, heaviest
plane, highest skyscraper and so on. My friends and me, we spend
countless hours digging through it, hoping to find the funniest or
coolest record (like this guy with the longest fingernails).

Now you can be part of a record too!
Dublay of Module23.com tries to reach for a Guinness Book of Records entry by creating the longest link-list ever.
Not only a funny idea, but also a good way to advertise your page, the
higher in the list you are, the more people will see your page if this
idea catches on (read: if it’ll be posted at digg)<br/>
Great idea.

The Worlds Biggest Linklist – A Guinness Record Tryout

Funny religional artifacts:
“Despite their reputation
as fierce warriors, Maasai culture revolves around their cattle. One of
their spiritual beliefs is that their rain god Ngai gave all cattle to
the Maasai people, and therefore anyone else who possesses cattle must
have stolen them from the Maasai.”

Why does it sound so utterly familiar?