Sunday, January 04, 2009

Israel's Tweets - Press Conferences on Twitter!

Twitter / israelconsulate

The Israel Consulate now has a twitter account and has been offering updates to the conflict and holding "tweet" news conferences.  As many of you know, I am a fan of Twitter and of 12second.TV (and of current tv as well), and feel that the next new communication breakout will be via twitter.  This new development, Israel Citizen's "press Conference," helps solidify my case.

Reading the New York Times, Noam Cohen wrote a nice piece on the twitter press conference titled "The Toughest Q's Answered in the  Briefest Tweets."  Noting the trend of moving from traditional news sources to the new social media/new media sources that presents an interactive element with the audience, Cohen notes the Military Channel on YouTube that offers the illusion of transparency in military action.

There are, I believe, some interesting consequences in this move to social media (A move that the Obama team in making in mass considering the number of "Obama" folks following me on twitter).  First, getting a message in 140 characters or less offers a feeling of intimacy but also limits firm attempts at communication.  You can sell a brand in 140 characters, but can you explain a military action in deeper terms other than "they deserved it" or as soon to be president Bush might have said, "its us against them."

Judging from the conference tweets, yes and no.  What helps, of course, is the ability to link to other sources including traditional news articles, YouTube videos and central blogs.  What also helps again is the idea that the "Israel Consulate" will DM (Direct Message) you back, again creating the feeling of both transparency and intimacy which is so terribly lacking in traditional news forums. 

Yet as I write this, I do note that Twitter, like other innovative devices before it, is falling to the same "devils" of destruction.  Advertisers are tweeting like crazy and using the search functions to find out who is tweeting their product names and why.  Also, as reported yesterday, there has been a serious effort to hijack people's twitter accounts and send DMs directing those you follow to a virus loaded site.  . . . is there anything that can be kept pure?  Doubt it.

2 comments:

  1. How about the fact that a great many people are donating their Facebook statuses to groups that are providing a step-by-step account of the conflict from an Israeli or a Palestinian point of view? So every time one signs on to Facebook, one gets bombarded by all these updates on our subscribing friends' statuses! We are greatly informed, quick and constant, but all in soundbytes, and no real no depth.

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  2. Miss Trudy, as always, awesome to see you! :)I totally agree with your assessment. Yet the implied intimacy and transparency is what is key here. You feel like you are in the mix which gives applications like Twitter the edge over other apps. Plus the fact it is only 140 characters-another illusion of a sound communication presentation (even if its not). Ah, the sound bite culture we certainly are (except for me and you who cannot write really small posts to our blogs hehehehe). R

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