Twitter, provides users with a social networking concept that is built upon simplicity. Each user registered with Twitter holds a unique account and web address that allows them to become their own media, in just 140 characters per update. This 140 characterful limit, within a globally connected technology savvy society has been known as micro-blogging.  With the rapid spread of kind-to-time information, the developers of Twitter have created, potentially, the easiest to navigate and use social networking yet. In the following tutorial I will walk you through the ease of Twitter navigation.

Note: Prior to beginning this two-step Twitter tutorial one must have an account existing with Twitter.  To create an account, direct your web browser to www.twitter.com and click on the ‘Get Started-Join‘ link provided in green. Twitter also provides a short ‘Twitter in Plain Language’ video for each new user wanting to find out more prior to account creation. Web navigation will bring brand new users to a ‘Join the Conversation’ page. On this sign up page fill in the required fields, careful to submit only the information exactally how you wish for it to appear. Twitter user names are limited to a short 15 charactures, this limit is due to the fact when others reply directly the user name will take up charatures of the post. A short user name is ideal and can be easily changed within without loosing information.  A valid user e-mail address must be provided, Twitter does send out updates but one can opt out of recieving them by clicking the check box below the e-mail address field. Review this information and click ‘create my account’ to get started with a basic Twitter page.

Step One: Building Twitter Relationships.

[1.] Logged into to Twitter, click on the ‘Find Friends’ link located at the very top of the vertical navigation menu. Web navigation will retrieve a ‘Find people. Follow them’ page which allows each user four various options.

Find on Twitter:

This service allows for each curious user to find and follow a user based on user name, given name, or specific subject. In the provided search box simply enter one of those options, per search, and click the search button or use the enter key. Navigation will bring up a ‘Results’ page. Scroll through the page to find the correct account and click ‘follow’. Depending on the keyword entered, search results can arrange from zero accounts to a few hundred. Results containing many account holders can be searched by scrolling through the page and clicking on the ‘next’ navigation button to get to the following page(s). A user can search in minimal time as each account ‘Bio’ or the subject of page, is listed per line following each user’s name, a user also can search by clicking on the user name and scrolling through the Twitter page for that user. Navigate back by the back button of the browser.

Keyword search examples: Tweeter_Pated, Clayton Morris, Fox News, twit_revolution, Twitter, and so forth

Note: Personally, I find this function the best when searching for possible accounts via Twitter’s web service. Interesting accounts can be quickly found by typing in a subjective keyword.

Find on Other Networks:

This Twitter function allows for each user to inquire about their friends, acquaintances, co-workers, and/or family members Twitter accounts.  Each search is that of the users personalized address book. Twitter currently allows for three major web mail providers to be searched.  Click on your choice of Gmail, Yahoo, or AOL, type in your web mail domain & password for that domain, and then click the ‘continue’ arrow. Searches will vary in time by the listings in each personalized address book with longer searches of large address books. Once retrieved a list of Twitter users will be provided with a ‘follow’ option for each account. Click ‘follow’ for each account wishing to be followed.

Note: Address book searches are only successful if the specific recorded e-mail address is used for account creation. If you cannot find your friends, ask them for their Twitter URL or Twitter information.

Invite By Email:

This Twitter service allows for Twitter users to expand their database of friends by inviting friends, family, acquaintances, and/or co-workers to Twitter. Simply put in the accurate e-mail listing for each indivudial into the box provided, separated by commas, and click ‘invite’. Twitter generates a mass e-mail with the senders user name, and web link within a ‘sign up now’ invite & social networking descriptive message. Accounts that follow the specific invite request web link will then be added directly to your list of friends when created.

Suggested Users:

Twitter randomly spawns a list of interesting account holders by popularity, for the user to expand their friend following network. Once followed one can receive these unique account holders updates. Users have the option to ‘select all’, or scroll through the list checking one by one, clicking the ‘follow’ arrow at the end of the session. More about these unique popular Twitter users can be seen in the ‘bio’ section of the retrieval box and more information can be found by clicking the user name of the specific interesting Twitter user.

Note: My personal suggestion with this function is only to add those accounts that are familiar as you will receive updates per posting from them. The more people you add the more updates you will receive. Twitter limits its API of 100 updates at a time, thus some account updates that you wish to see may be lost in the clutter of updates on your account home page. Add with digression.

Mentions, Friend Lists, and Trending Topic:

[2.]  You may choose to add other Twitter users a number of personal ways such as:

[A]- Click on a highlighted @username, also called a mention, that is contained on another users page.  Navigation will take a user straight away to that specific users Twitter account, users will want to review the Twitter page and ‘Bio’ beforehand than click the ‘follow’ navigation button appearing under each account name/photo to follow the user.

[B]- See who your friends are following & see who currently follows them. By clicking on the ‘following’ or the ‘followers’ link under a friends bio, search navigation will retrieve a list of people either followed or who follows that friend (depending on the choice). A user will review that information and click follow on side button navigation or scan the account by clicking the user name and adding them by clicking the ‘follow’ button appearing under the photo and user name to the left.

[C]- ‘Trending Topics’ are a list of subjects that are currently popularly discussed on Twitter at the time, these lists are constantly updating,  these subject or topics can be found at the lower part of the right side home page navigation menu. For each topic a link is provided. Clicking on the link of the chosen subject will bring up a search containing current updates mentioning the topic, to the right. Interesting concepts, agreeable opinions, or like-minded people may be found by searching these topics. Follow those interesting by following the steps above. Again, add with digressions.

Other Possible Ways: Index Sources

Twitter friend-finding subjectivity also remains an idea on many third party websites & applications. These third party websites operate as friendly yellow pages for  Twitter account holders. A user will find a third party website of interest, I have listed a few below, and in the content search box type in a name, user name, or keyword for a workable search that retrieves the result of many users per keyword. Once a user is found of interest, clicking on the user name will direct to the specific user name, review information, and add with digression.

[A] Wefollow.
Allows users to search through a Twitter directory by category, these categories are made when each Twitter user submits their names and tag lines.

[B] NearbyTweets.
Allows users to search through the Twitter directory by location, users will type in a keyword and a location following the simple steps to receive local Twitter users or user’s local to a specific location of interest. Multiple locations can be searched per search request.

[C] JustTweetIt.
Similar to WeFollow this service allows users to submit their name to a Twitter directory with tag line subjective to the focus of their own blog. Users will search through the topics and click on user names to review each Twitter page.

[D] Twitter Search.
Twitter search allows users to find each other by a subjective topic. To find these topics type in the keyword of choice after ‘# symbol’ (you may also search without this symbol for broader searches) these symbols denote hash tags or topics. Twitter search is greatly beneficial for users as they advance in skill level.

Note: When adding other Twitter users to a account, I highly advise all to take the extra effort to read both the ‘bio’ and Twitter content in full.

Unfollowing a User

Tired of following a user? User pages can be easily removed from an account in one of two ways.

1. The upper right side navigation reminds us of both ‘follows’ (the accounts we are following) and ‘followers’ (the accounts following us). Click on ‘follow’  and scroll through the list to find a specific user no longer wanted to be followed and click the ‘remove’ button to the right. Click again will allow you to follow the user, if you changed your mind.

2. Go to the specific page of the user no longer wanting to be followed, by typing in the URL or clicking on the user name. Under the user name a ‘following’ button will appear under the profile photo to remind a user they are following this user. Clicking the ‘following’ button will allow a user to have the option to no longer follow them. Click again if you wish to follow if your mind has been changed.

Step Two: Starting a Conversation via Twitter

1. Operating on a popularized concept known as ‘micro-blogging’, Twitter limits each user’s post to a quick 140 characters. Each 140 character limited ‘tweet’ answers the question ‘What are you doing.’ Individuals simply fill in the text box at the top of the homepage with their brain based content. A word counter shows characters left warning users with red numbering when less than 10 characters remain. Twitter’s web based service, cell phone platform, & third party web based browsers will only allow content to be posted if the character limitation is followed. To post your content click on the update button or hit enter if using another Twitter service. If the update button is shaded gray, content contains more than 140 characters or Twitter’s service is down and will be up shortly.

Note: If you are using Twitter’s web based service posts can successfully be deleted but not edited. On the Twitter web based home page or profile page, hover your mouse over the post desired to be deleted. To the right a trash can icon will appear, after clicking the icon the prompt will ask you if you wish to continue to delete the post, simply click okay and continue.

2. Interactions on Twitter can successfully be achieved with little work. Twitter allows each user to become their own media providing them the space to create, edit, and censor their own content. To share your content with another Twitter user, or group of Twitter users, an ‘at reply’ is necessary for two way conversation. At replies contain the @ symbol and user name of the user one wants to chat with, looking like @username or @Tweeter_Pated. Users can freely follow short micro-blogging conversations by clicking on each at reply and reading the response provided. At replies are not mandated to users followed or users who are following.

3. Located on the right side homepage navigation bar, located under ‘home’ each user will see their @username. Clicking on this @username link will retrieve a page of Twitter mentions (this is when another user replies to you using your name in an at reply). These mentions can be replied to by hovering the mouse over the content and clicking on the arrow appearing over the trash can.  One can also reply to direct posts while scrolling through other users Twitter pages, in the same manner. After the reply arrow is clicked, in both of these concepts, a user will see an automated ‘at reply’ to the user in the text box. Content is typically written after this reply.

Note: When responding with an ‘at reply’ the @ symbol is mandatory. This symbol allows for the user to know their postings have been applied to so they can simply respond back. Also a user needs to make sure, if not using the ‘reply’ arrow, each user name is spelled correctly.

4. Twitter’s social networking allows for short e-mails to be sent in the form of ‘direct messages’. Micro-blogging also carries onward to these direct messages of 140 characters or less. Twitter allows for these direct messages to be sent, only if the the user is followed.

[A] Retrieving direct messages can be done by clicking on the ‘direct message’ link in the right side navigation menu.

[B] To respond to an already sent direct message, hover your mouse over the message, click the arrow, and type in your direct message text into the text box above. Users will not see an ‘at reply’ nor will direct messages show up publicly on Twitter pages.

[C] To send a connected user a ‘direct message’ navigates to the specific users page and click on the ‘message’ link in the right side navigation. Again, you need to be connected to the user to send a direct message; likewise the user needs to be connected to your page to respond.

Note: These direct messages have to follow the micro-blogging concept of 140 characters or less. One can make sure of a correct direct message path by reviewing the username appearing above the text box in the send direct message tag line. Twitter allows users to save time by providing a drop down menu naming all users connected to the account. Like e-mails direct messages cannot be retrieved once sent. Users can review direct messages by clicking on the ‘sent’ tab.

Happy Tweeting!

Twitter is a simple to use, a free social networking site that enables its users to send and receive updates known as ‘tweets’. Twitter puts a limit of 140 characters on each text-based tweet, a concept that was first defined by Twitter known as ‘micro-blogging’. These micro-blogging concepts are displayed on each user’s profile, giving each user a public voice as they create their own media content. Making Twitter different from other popular known social networking mediums is the ability for users to post content on and off of the Internet via cell phone services. Each ‘tweep’ or Twitter user has the option to make their page private or public, with an overwhelming majority being public content pages. Each user update disperses through the Twitter population, appearing instantly to other users who have subscribed to their feed. These subscribed users are known as ‘followers’. Public pages hold no restrictions on who is allowed to view each update & remains a dream world for the stalker in us, but private pages can easily be restricted to a chosen group of friends. Tweets can be reviewed, sent, and created through a variety of web-based external applications and third party clients as well as the Internet, and mobile phone mediums. Each user can determine, based upon their networking needs, the medium they wish to use. Rising is the number of users who connect via mobile phones which allow for the transaction of SMS, or short message services. SMS services may charge a fee; these vary based upon each individual phone service provider. Typically, the average Twitter user connects through the Internet while large majorities using both the Internet and mobile phone and some using multiple technological based mediums.

Leading the current social networking revolution, Twitter was created by Jack Dorsey in 2006 but gained colossal notability at the start of 2009. This notability was made largely in part by mainstream media sources as well as the growing number of celebrity users. This not only brought notability but both widespread and worldwide popularly. Often described as the ‘SMS of the Internet’, Twitter provides its users to comfortably transfer short updated tweets via application based programming. Each tweet acting as text messages obscures Twitter greatly and has allowed for its rapid popularity increase as the favored social networking medium.

The numbers of users that use Twitter daily vary, estimates show, because Twitter does not publicly release the number of activated accounts being held. An estimate of 4-5 million users was given in November 2008, prior to the overwhelming rise of mentions in mainstream media. Social networking studies done in early February 2009 show that with its 55 million views each month Twitter as the third leading social network following MySpace and the most popular Facebook. To no surprise, the popularity gained by mainstream media outlets has allowed Twitter to be known as the fastest-growing site, in March 2009. This growth rests at 1382% where as growth of the leading network of Facebook being only 228%.

Avid social networking users of the Internet, commonly ask the question ‘can Twitter successfully host this growing network of users with its limited funding’? Google, remains on top as a multi-billion dollar industry however Twitter’s funding is currently a chunk over $50 million. A breakdown of financials shows $57 million of Twitter is owned by venture capitalists, a type of private equity that serves companies in the early stages of growth and development. Backed largely by private partners, in addition to the $22 million raised by Twitter’s CEO Even Williams, Twitter gained another $35 million in mid February 2009 by these private partners such as Union Square Ventures. This money was obtained through the third round of Twitter’s secure funding adventures. This lack of funding, and hosting, is the primary reason Twitter has began to experience problems related to its rapidly growing number of users. With the vast majority of these problems resulting from traffic overloads. Giving early adopters mixed feelings about the site’s ability to compensate. These arising problems and also early hacking/phishing attempts may be reason for Twitter’s 40% retention rate. Nothing yet has stopped Twitter’s mass success and rapid global spread. Winning 2009’s ‘Breakout of the Year’ Webby Award. Twitter is currently trying to compensate for its spotty performance by increasing its funding to gain better supportive hosts. Thus far, clearing up the majority of day to day site issues and errors such as slow speed rates and over capacity errors

As some users start to feel ‘too’ connected, grappling with the desire, at odd hours, to update their friend’s about their personal life. Other’s answer the question ‘what are you doing’ many ways. This question has overall been trademarked of sorts by Twitter’s social networking, as it appears prior to each mico-blogging update text box. While the average personal Twitter account holder micro-blogs about their personal live, other users such as emergency officials use it to bring updates to the community they serve. Increasing in population with Fire, EMS, and Police, Twitter use allows these officials to create a page to update their community of safety, fire updates, crime updates, and more. The use of Twitter in Marketing allows for positive brand marketing as word is spread globally about a particular company such as KFC, one of the many uses of Twitter for Marketing ventures allow for these companies to post sales and coupon saving codes. Media outlets are also starting to use Twitter as a source of public sentiment on current event issues. Twitter was used on the 2009 presidential campaign trail by Barack Obama and is growing with outlets such as Fox and CNN to allow for the public community to voice their diverse opinions. Word is being spread about good causes and charity events such as breast cancer, animal rights, save the children, etc through Twitter. Twitter is also a very popular place for celebrities to connect with friends as well as their fan-base allowing the fans to directly share their support and opinions. As a growing social networking revolution, Twitter allows for unlimited ideas to be gained and shared by a connected global society reaching out towards the unknown while bringing people closer together.