The Twitterization of Conversations

November 24, 2008 By

Yesterday I filmed a video about the half-life of conversations. When I started blogging back in 2000 a blog conversation could go for a week or more. Those days are long gone. In this video I cover why, and show you some ways that tools can be used to lengthen the conversation’s half life (which, on Twitter, can be as short as five minutes).

This video caused a conversation to break out on FriendFeed.

[kyte.tv appKey=MarbachViewerEmbedded&uri=channels/6118/277917&embedId=49424382&premium=true&height=500&width=425]

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  • http://www.directmarketingobservations.com/ Marc Meyer

    Robert, The emergence of so many social nets has decreased our attention span but increased our interest in more things, and more communities-but also has reduced the types of participation, or the depth of that participation.

  • http://www.directmarketingobservations.com Marc Meyer

    Robert, The emergence of so many social nets has decreased our attention span but increased our interest in more things, and more communities-but also has reduced the types of participation, or the depth of that participation.

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  • http://ariwriter.com Ari Herzog

    I’m with 100 percent. Not sure why this would spark debate. Is logical to me.

  • http://feeds.feedburner.com/ariwriter Ari Herzog

    I’m with 100 percent. Not sure why this would spark debate. Is logical to me.

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  • http://shiv.me/ Shiva

    @Ari and @scoble

    Is it logical?! I would think that this half-life is very personal. For people like Robert, the half-life is really small (only a few seconds), since that is his reading pattern. I still know a lot of people who don’t use feed, don’t use twitter etc.. and their half-life is still several days.

    Personally, I mark items I want to process more, as part of a custom feed I create using instapaper and process them over the weekend. Of course this means that I can’t really be part of the conversation instantaneously, but I do get the time to go back reflect upon the content.

    I do agree that FF’s grouping of conversation is way more useful. I think twitter needs to address that somehow. (I can almost sense a new tool for twitter here.)

    Get in touch with me if you have an idea for a tool here.

  • http://shiv.me Shiva

    @Ari and @scoble

    Is it logical?! I would think that this half-life is very personal. For people like Robert, the half-life is really small (only a few seconds), since that is his reading pattern. I still know a lot of people who don’t use feed, don’t use twitter etc.. and their half-life is still several days.

    Personally, I mark items I want to process more, as part of a custom feed I create using instapaper and process them over the weekend. Of course this means that I can’t really be part of the conversation instantaneously, but I do get the time to go back reflect upon the content.

    I do agree that FF’s grouping of conversation is way more useful. I think twitter needs to address that somehow. (I can almost sense a new tool for twitter here.)

    Get in touch with me if you have an idea for a tool here.

  • Jas

    Another comparison post on FriendFeed and Twitter? Yay…

  • Jas

    Another comparison post on FriendFeed and Twitter? Yay…

  • http://www.arasmus.com/ Arasmus

    Micro-blogging is the substitution of Narrative with “Isative.” The death of Narrative has dropped us all into a stream of present-sense impressions sans conclusion. We live now like characters of stories past with no indication of our fate beyond the next Twitter.

    http://www.arasmus.com/microblog/2008/11/25/blooming-terminus.html

  • http://www.arasmus.com Arasmus

    Micro-blogging is the substitution of Narrative with “Isative.” The death of Narrative has dropped us all into a stream of present-sense impressions sans conclusion. We live now like characters of stories past with no indication of our fate beyond the next Twitter.

    http://www.arasmus.com/microblog/2008/11/25/blooming-terminus.html

  • http://www.StevenLending.com/ Steven Barchetti

    Hey Robert

    I agree with your findings that the new tools are getting better.

    With that being said, I do believe it is our responsibility as users to help the developers expand and improve on the platform that they have put out so far.

    It is always great to follow your input, because you get to see some much technology first hand with your travels and interviews.

    I don’t think the developers even realized what was possible with some of the application we now have in the market.

    I just hope they continue to make them better, because everyone will benefit!

    Steven

    King Of Finance & Social Media

  • http://www.StevenLending.com Steven Barchetti

    Hey Robert

    I agree with your findings that the new tools are getting better.

    With that being said, I do believe it is our responsibility as users to help the developers expand and improve on the platform that they have put out so far.

    It is always great to follow your input, because you get to see some much technology first hand with your travels and interviews.

    I don’t think the developers even realized what was possible with some of the application we now have in the market.

    I just hope they continue to make them better, because everyone will benefit!

    Steven

    King Of Finance & Social Media

  • http://www.loanmodificationstudio.com/articles/articleslist.html Loan Modification

    Of course its natural. not only are there more people on the planet than there were back in 200o for example, but there are more blogs and most importantly more important stuff that absolutely needs to be posted. It makes you wonder how we ever survived back in 1999.

    (Also I wish to extend my condolances (alltohough 8 years late) to robert, for NOT having had thousands of friends online back then.) ;-)

  • http://www.loanmodificationstudio.com/articles/articleslist.html Loan Modification

    Of course its natural. not only are there more people on the planet than there were back in 200o for example, but there are more blogs and most importantly more important stuff that absolutely needs to be posted. It makes you wonder how we ever survived back in 1999.

    (Also I wish to extend my condolances (alltohough 8 years late) to robert, for NOT having had thousands of friends online back then.) ;-)

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  • http://idoinfotech.com/ Gary

    Interesting and so true. The days of slow and long online dialogue are mostly over (there is still a space for the drawn out online dialogue such as in some academic circles)!

  • http://idoinfotech.com Gary

    Interesting and so true. The days of slow and long online dialogue are mostly over (there is still a space for the drawn out online dialogue such as in some academic circles)!