Information is everywhere and using tools to manage that information is part of what librarianship is all about. Increasingly, librarianship also embraces the act of helping users create information. Twitter (http://twitter.com/), RSS, and Pushnote (http://pushnote.com/user/register)--three of the many social networking and content filtering tools available--each uniquely attempt to help users focus on only desired content and allow users to actively create and share information with others. Each one will appeal to different sets of users for different tasks.
Twitter is an up-to-the-second way to communicate with the world. Users send brief notes about their thoughts, their actions, information they have found, etc. These notes can also include links, pictures, and other content that works around the 40-character limit. Most directly, Twitter users connect with specific people, but tweets are also readable by anyone on Twitter (tweeps or twitterers). Twitter excels at helping users stay up to date with their contacts and with what is happening in the world--especially if users have cell phones. The best feature, however, is the search bar. I appreciate being able to search hash tags (for example #libraries, #ebooks, #sunshine) to get others' perspectives on topics, to find interesting information, or to just find something to smile about.
Another use for Twitter is to help a person scope out the current environment. One article I read 1 discusses Twitter as the subject of a social sciences study. Twitter could also be used as part of a STEP analysis (see http://www.managingchange.com/step/overview.htm). Either way, Twitter is useful for gathering current data.
RSS has both less and more than Twitter. Following Twitter accounts is like receiving a constant barrage of information tidbits. If a user does not catch and read a tidbit, it keeps right on flying and is supplanted by new tweets. RSS, on the other hand, only informs users when the sites they follow have been updated. For most websites, these updates are less frequent but they often contain more substantial content. In addition, feeds usually track how many updates the user has yet to read. Keeping up with an RSS feed takes more time and more effort than following others on Twitter. In my experience, RSS feeds also tends to help the user focus more tightly on a topic than tweets, which can be a bit unpredictable. RSS seems to be more of a one-way communication than either Twitter or Pushnote, but users can often respond to posts directly on the website they are following. RSS is more topic-based, but is less interactive than the other options.
Pushnote, the tool I am least familiar with, lets users comment on websites and see others' comments on them. It also provides buttons for easily integrating those comments into a Twitter feed or a Facebook post. The strength of Pushnote is that it is content-driven but also based on interpersonal communication and personal authority. I could see Pushnote being useful for group collaborations. Members of a group could suggest pages to use as resources or for ideas and easily share how they think each site would be useful.
I know how I will use each of these tools. I will use RSS most regularly to keep up with topics of interest to me. I will turn to Twitter when I want to find current opinions or to explore a topic I have just discovered. When I want to share information, I will consider using a combination of Pushnote and Twitter. I will also keep all three tools in mind when helping library users.
How will you use them?
1. Ovandia, S. (2009). Exploring the potential of Twitter as a research tool. Social and Behavioral Librarian , 28(4), 202-205.
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