My first tweet

When I first started this blog, I started with a self-referential piece .

There I covered snail mail, fax, email, Usenet News and instant messaging (AIM and others). Since then I have been blogging, and I have stats on what people look at. My most popular posts appear to be those on Zulu weddings, and my visitto the school where One Laptop per Child was launched in Nigeria.

Since then I learned IRC, (which you see below), which is a more refined tool than the old unix “talk” where you just banged a message on their screen. I like IRC, and especially the Cape Linux Users Group IRCchatroom. A busy linux users group, where we get together once in a while,either for technical talks or Geek dinners. It is my first port of call if I am stuck on some problem to do with programming or system administration.

Facebook arrived. Facebook has a walled garden feel to it - you are writing to and for your friends, not the world at large. Its major value is connecting with old friends, like school buddies. A lot of the privacy options are slipping away as Facebook try to monetize their incredible popularity.

I am a trailing edge technology guy - 5 year old laptop is fine. This philosophy has served me well over GoogleWave. But you buy new once in a while. So, I have resisted Twitter, as another rolled over version of stuff we have seen before above, but maybe it is different.

So I am blogging the IRC conversation that lead to my first tweet. Delicate temperaments might be a little surprised at the robust exchanges, but inreal-time cyberspace there is a sliding line between truth and fiction, joking and seriousness. Spinach, below, is a ‘bot - a program that lives in the chatroom to perform helpful things like check the weather forecast and leave people messages.

  • 19:20 * wizzy gets a 3 minute international phone call from Kenneth Kaunda’s grandson replying to http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User\_talk:Mkaund_
  • 20:01 <&highvoltage> wizzy: wow :)
  • 20:01 <&highvoltage> wizzy: you should tweet that
  • 20:07 * wizzy doesn’t tweet
  • 20:07 <&highvoltage> it’s about time you start.
  • 20:08 < wizzy> highvoltage: I’m scared
  • 20:08 <&highvoltage> that irc oneliner you posted is really cool but it will go forgotten in our irc logs.
  • 20:08 < wizzy> I am only just getting the hang of IRC
  • 20:09 <&highvoltage> I’m too and that didn’t stop me
  • 20:09 < wizzy> will it be remembered in tweet town?
  • 20:10 <&highvoltage> yep, people can mark it as a favourite, they can repeat it, google can find it, it can be indexed/searched better…
  • 20:10 <&highvoltage> just make sure Vhata follows you (at least in the beginning), and he’ll be sure to tell you when you do anything kak
  • 20:11 <&highvoltage> doing that and following some basic guidelines will turn you into a pro in no time
  • 20:13 <&tumbleweed> joe reports that GD change has been submitted to org.za
  • 20:47 <&highvoltage> man reflective screens suck in offices with stupid flourecent lighting
  • 21:00 < wizzy> Spinach: twitter
  • 21:00 < Spinach> wizzy: twitter is http://www.penny-arcade.com/comic/2008/4/23/_
  • 21:03 < wizzy> I bet Kenneth Kaunda’s grandson doesn’t tweet
  • 21:59 < wizzy> highvoltage: I tweeted. Am I as hip as Vhata yet?
  • 22:02 * Vhata is basically one large pelvic bone
  • 22:12 < wizzy> http://twitter.com/wizzyct_
  • 22:13 * wizzy is too much the noob to know if the hip people find out about their followers
  • 22:13 < cocooncrash> Spinach: last tweet from wizzyct
  • 22:13 < Spinach> cocooncrash: “wizzy gets a 3 minute international phone call from Kenneth Kaunda’s grandson replying tohttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User_talk:Mkaund” 19 minutes and 11 seconds ago,http://twitter.com/wizzyct/status/20163674522
  • 22:16 <&highvoltage> I just realised I don’t know how to favourite a tweet in twitter (identi.ca is easier like that)