Be Interesting. Be Real.

When confronted by Twitter for the first time, many newbies freeze. What do I write?

One of my favorite Twitter users, @unmarketing, recently blogged about when to blog and when not to (http://www.un-marketing.com/blog/2010/04/09/frequently-futile-how-often-should-you-blog/).

Now that we've all become content creators (whether we like this realiity or not), it's become imperative that you understand the answers to these questions.

For so long, we sat by passively as others churned their content at us. I remember in the early days of the Internet, big media companies and advertisers scoffed at the prospect of people actually wanting to create their own content, instead of having it done for them. Many of them have since gone out of business.

I mean, really, what could we nobodies have to say that would rival the relevance of Jon and Kate Plus Eight, or the latest mistress out of the woodwork from Tiger Woods? Yeah. Pretty much ANYTHING you have to say is more interesting to me that that crap. I know I'm not alone in believing this.

There are a million things that happen in each person's day. (And yes, some people choose to blog/Twitter about all of them. I don't recommend this.) The color, the flavor, the tenor of your day, though, is specific to you and your perception of it. And that's what I want to hear about.

FAR too many blogs and Twitter posts hover around the "how do we make money from this crap?" tangent. They aim their posts at marketing something to you. I avoid these posts/blogs like the plague. I care about them as little as I care about Tiger Woods.

Realize that we are in a distinctly different time now. Our mission, all of us, is to take what is valuable from our lives and broadcast that to others. Podcast it, blog it, Tweet it, LiveStream it, however you've gotta do it, just do it. But consider editing a bit. Just because the world is now your blank slate, doesn't mean that we are all hungering for each salivating morsel of it.

Play by plays of each sandwich you make probably can take a blog pass. But that encounter you had with the grocer that made your day? THAT I want to hear about.

In short, what is important to you? should be the top Twitter question. If you retweet others (and you should), it should be something that moves you. If you #FollowFriday others (and you should), it should be people whose posts really make your week better. That is how we show our interconnectedness. (If I value you, and you value someone else, perhaps I might get something out of their Tweets too?)

Those who haven't yet jumped on the Twitter bandwagon might not understand this. Or those, like the collosal jerkoff Conan O'Brien, who made such a big show about following one person (without realizing all it said was, to a mass audience: I don't understand Twitter at all.) It's not about one to one anymore, or even one to many. It's even more than many to many. It's like we are all part of a giant rushing stream, and we are compelled to contribute our important part.

Sure, if you want, you can get all uppity and protect your Tweets (also not understanding Twitter), but it's all about the discourse now. Shy folks, private souls need not participate.

We are twisting and molding and shaping our future right now. From the hands of those who would shovel crap down our throats. We can make it whatever we want. But to do that, we have to distinctly and clearly voice what is important to us.

Implicit within that is also one of the rallying cries of the new age. We, the imperfect, are taking over this world from those who would force perfection on us. So we have podcasts using shitty mics, and blogs with typos and Tweets that are typed when we are drunk. Yep. We do that, and it's ok. In fact, it's great. Imperfection is what is valued now.

Adam Curry talks about the new authenticity. Being real and honest and true is the currency of today. Mainstream media has forgotten what truth is all about. We need to remind them. Constantly.

Unmarketing was talking about some people's need for a "blog schedule" (every day, or every week, or every Friday). He was at SXSW. He wants to post whenever the spirit moves him. And you know what? That's ok. In fact, that is how it works today. You share something when you have something to share. I'll still be paying attention to you, once it's there.

I don't demand perfection from you, and I hope you don't demand it from me. Let's just get real together, shall we? Cause we all can make the world a better place that way.

My roommate and I were chatting about the online experience. I was trying to get her to enjoy Twitter as much as I do, or at least understand what it's really all about. (She still doesn't.)

She's quite a wonderful, gregarious person with many friends. It seemed like it would be a natural transition for her. I think today I finally realized where our great divide is. She really doesn't get the whole "online" thing. Mind you, she's an Internet person. The bulk of her income is derived online. But it's the very things I think she's most good at IRL that baffle her online: the chatting, the social, the life.

Which mystifies me. Until she said one thing today which explained everything to me, and made me wonder how many others have this same boggle with Twitter. She said she doesn't like chat rooms and doesn't understand their function.

For me, and I consider myself to be a tech-savvy geek girl with a wide variety of friends, my online experience began in the chat rooms of AOL, back in the early 1990s. Mostly I was just trying to (much as I still am now) figure out what this is all about, where we are, and where we are going with this. Certainly the "normies" of the time accused me of spending too much time online, much as the "normies" now do too.

My response then, as now, is: You don't understand. This is where I live.

This is where I socialize, this is where I learn about things, this is (hopefully soon) where I work.

Not that I neglect my real life to do online things either. I think it's essential to have balance about it. But the way I look at it is that the online experience has replaced the bars and smoky rooms of former days. And if I have an interest in antique cars, for example, I'm quite sure there's a chat room or online group out there somewhere where I can talk to others with just such a passion. 

I thought about it after my roommate and I chatted, and most of my very closest friends today: those who've helped me through thick and thin, who've helped me move across the country, even--I met in a chat room, or online.

For me, the online experience has enriched and enlivened my life. Chat rooms and online worlds and places like Facebook and MySpace and Twitter are my constant online party. I can circulate from this tech guru to that movie director to this hot guy in the space of a few hours. Or, I can put on my "I'm looking for a job" hat and search the job forums.  It is work, it is play, it is my life, and you never know who you're going to meet here, or who is going to give you that special tidbit that helps you make it through your day.

The online experience is so deeply a part of my psyche that I cannot imagine life without it. When I was without Internet briefly in January, I palpably felt like I was missing so much of the ongoing conversation. It's become a spiritual experience, a romantic connection, a comedy club: whatever it is I'm in the mood for, whatever part of myself I need to express, there is a way to do that online. Even expressing my fantasy self in Second Life, if I like.

When I first got on AOL, I felt like I wanted to talk to the whole world. And now, with Twitter, I almost feel like I can. I have people on my Twitter stream who tweet in German and French and Spanish (languages I understand). I helps me to broaden my horizons in ways I didn't know I needed my horizons broadened.

Someone recently said that, with Twitter, they no longer need to check a newspaper. They get all the news of the day right there, from the people who most care about what they care about.

My roommate is in her early 70s. Maybe it's too late for her to ever get it. And maybe I don't get it as much as a 20-year-old. But boy, am I glad that I'm able to be part of this conversation. This is where the world is turning right now. I'm excited to see what the future holds.