How best to keep track of twitter discussions

Replies to This Discussion

Permalink Reply by LeeAnn Moore on October 27, 2009 at 5:21am

When I twitter from my phone, I save a lot as favorited. I've been having to do that at work as well since many of the url shorteners are blocked at school. When I have extra time, I go back through my favorites and use diigo to save the ones I really want. I use google reader for rss feeds.

Permalink Reply by Jarrett Dooley on October 27, 2009 at 11:06am

I would like to know some hints on this topic as well. I struggle to keep up with the information (highly valuable links) being tweeted by my PLN. Does anybody use a specific program to keep up with the feed?

In reply to LeeAnn, if you use TweetDeck, you can get around the URL shorteners at your school by selecting the option to "Show Preview Information for Short URLs." See image below, it is in Settings on the General tab. When you click on shortened URLs, a box pops up where you will see the regular link.

Permalink Reply by LeeAnn Moore on October 29, 2009 at 2:06pm

Thank you for the url information, Jarrett! I have another tweetdeck question: I set up tweetdeck to automatically send my tweets to facebook too, but now I'd like to cancel that and I don't know how. Can anyone help?

Permalink Reply by Deb Wilson on November 11, 2009 at 11:21pm

You may want to look in the application settings of facebook, you should be able to remove it there.

Permalink Reply by Jeffrey D. Blackburn on October 29, 2009 at 6:28pm

Yup - up by where you write tweets there should be two boxes - one would say your FB username or your name and the other your twitter name. By clicking the box the name either is white or grey and that toggles which service you are communicating with!



LeeAnn Moore said:

Thank you for the url information, Jarrett! I have another tweetdeck question: I set up tweetdeck to automatically send my tweets to facebook too, but now I'd like to cancel that and I don't know how. Can anyone help?

Permalink Reply by MatthiasHeil on October 30, 2009 at 2:59pm

Since I see Twitter as a tool to connect with people who share your interests, "thinking people" seems to be a more productive way when it comes to management than "thinking resources" - in order to keep track of what and who is most important to me, I use several columns in TweetDeck: the first column is the "all followers" column, a quickly paced stream of ideas and resources, which I cannot, and/or do not want to follow altogether. Then there is one column titled "English buddies" in which there are about 40 persons' tweets, a stream that moves at a slower pace. A third column is the same for "German buddies" (as tweeting German educators are still rare, this stream moves even slower) - and that's about it, really. I can follow most (if not all) tweets by the people I treasure most, and "dip my head" into the "all followers" stream as often as I can/want for inspiration, every now and then adding people to the other two columns, and/or removing a few from there, back into the "all followers" stream. - This works beautifully for me, maybe it does for you.

In general, I do not know if it is feasible not to "miss something" in Twitter - I've long quit the idea of getting everything people have to say there. This is not at all personal, but I just cannot find the time. Actually, I would feel rather pressured If I shared this "take all there is" approach. Sticking to the "stream" metaphor may support this: You need to breathe every now and then, respectively move your head out of the (main) stream...

Permalink Reply by sharpjacqui on October 30, 2009 at 3:09pm

I do the same as LeeAnn where I will favourite on my phone and when I get time I look at the favourites on my computer and save the sites that are great to Delicious. 2022 websites saved at this point, all tagged and bundled for easy searching http://delicious.com/sharpjacqui

Permalink Reply by Mary Beth Hertz on November 3, 2009 at 10:41am

To archive tweets, check out this resource: http://www.readwriteweb.com/archives/10_ways_to_archive_your_tweets...

For keeping track of blogs, I love Google Reader. You can easily read all of your subscriptions in one window.

Permalink Reply by Neal Chambers on November 4, 2009 at 8:27pm

I think people have shared a lot of great techniques so far. I take the same approach as Matthias. I have sorted groups in Tweetdeck that I can look at when I'm in a hurry. And then occasionally dip my head into the main stream to check what people are doing. I even have a "new people" group so that I can check their Tweets and see if they are worth continuing to follow.
Something I would add to this discussion is the addition of filters to your stream to pick out certain resources. For example, on most Twitter apps you can filter your stream by certain keywords or phrases. I'll try to sort my stream by '?' (a question mark) at least once a day to see if anyone has a question I can answer for them. You can also filter it by "http" to just look at all the links people are tweeting. Or filter it by "RT" to find retweets. This is a great way to 'meet' new people in your stream. Sometimes someone only has a few followers and needs a question answered, but they get lost in the stream.
Other than that, I always like to ask people. Have you implemented every single thing you've learned from Twitter? Probably not, so missing a few bits and pieces isn't going to kill you. Implement what you've learned so far then go back to the stream and take another dip. You are already on the cutting edge by being on Twitter and being engaged.

Permalink Reply by Ann Leaness on November 7, 2009 at 9:14pm

Neal,
Thanks for this post. I have been using twitter for quite a while, but didn't know I could filter the stream so specifically. I am going to have to go try it out :)
Ann

Permalink Reply by Bonnie Frampton Faust on November 16, 2009 at 1:45am

I'm still fairly new to Twitter, only about 6 weeks or so. I have the best intentions of saving all of these great resources to my Delicious account (bonniefaust if anyone wants to link to me!) but I don't always have time. Often I will cheat by simply retweeting a link I really like. Then when I do have time, I'll go into the tweets I've sent and bookmark them that way.

At first I'd find myself compulsively scrolling through everyone's posts, afraid I'd miss something earthshattering. However, now that I'm following over 700 people, it quickly became overwhelming. That's when I truly began to appreciate Twitter for what it was: a place I could 'pop in' for 5 minutes and drink up all the knowledge I could, and go back later when I had a few free minutes again.

So, a roundabout answer to your question is, when I'm in a hurry I retweet (since I find it valuable I want to share it). Then when I have more time I bookmark it to my Delicious account.

Ironically, I've had occasion where I've wanted to bookmark something but because I'm not on my laptop it can be a pain in the neck to log in to Delicious, search for the URL and tag and save the site. So I've started tweeting the link instead, so I can go back and bookmark it later.

Permalink Reply by Ann Lusch on December 3, 2009 at 9:16am

I bookmark things to Diigo, and it doesn't take long. If I at least give it a tag, I can find it later when I need it. If I have time, I skim. When I have more time later (okay, not as often as I would like!), I go back and do some reading. Diigo also lets me highlight sections and make comments privately or publicly.

I only follow a couple hundred people so far, but I'm already at the point where I realize I'm not going to get every bit of information. So I just dip into the stream when I can. I love Tuesday night edchat, even if it does get crazy hard to follow at times with so many people. A lot of thinking people there, people passionate about education. Sometimes it's about websites, and sometimes it's just about being inspired.

• ‹ Previous
• 1
• 2
• Next ›
• Page