The growing twitosphere

HARTLAND TOWNSHIP, Mich. — Ignore Twitter at your own peril.

That was the message I heard from a presentation by Twitter media veteran T.J. Ortenzi at an Online News Association training seminar I attended last month in Ann Arbor. He cited some staggering numbers why. The microblogging Web site already has 25 million users and it's expected to quadruple to 100 million by the end of 2010 and 1 billion by 2013 (Well, Twitter thinks so in internal documents, anyway — we should be skeptical — we are journalists).
So, chances are the site stands to only increase in value as a tool for journalists and news organizations. As I've heard elsewhere, the session talked about how not only does Twitter provide a way to push out content, such as stories when they are published online, but it also can be a great way to provide breaking news.

In addition, Ortenzi, now associated news editor for The Huffington Post, described several leads on stories and sources he found while he ran the Twitter account for The Seattle Times. One example he made was when he followed the account of a competing TV station over the Fourth of July weekend to get the jump on a death of a Seattle-area soldier who died on our nation’s birthday. He responded to the tweet and got the scoop.

He also talked about how using the advanced search option, you can find people who are registered in your immediate coverage area. While you would still have to verify where they are from, it's yet another way to find quality sources. Ortenzi also discussed a new feature, Twitter lists, in which news organizations can more easily build a list of experts that the audience would want to follow.

Clearly, tweeting is more about announcing to the world your lastest story or blog post, it's also about building a community where people find you.

But I admit, it's hard to get into. Even as I type, Hashtags (#), @,  retweets (RT) still seem foreign to me. And the Twitter jargon only gets worse from there. That's part of the reason we're spending a week comtemplating how to use Twitter on the blogs. And since I've asked you to send me a brief plan on your strategy, I'll post one by midnight Saturday for this blog (only seems fair, right?) If anything, I hope it will help you with your assignment.

And if you comment on the plan here, you’ll receive double the EC points (2).