Micro-blogging: What is it and what’s the point?

Have you heard about micro-blogging yet?  It’s being talked about and written about in mainstream pubs like Time Magazine.  The two best known micro blogging players are Twitter and Jaiku.  Here’s how it works.  You sign onto a micro-blogging social site and connect with your friends and you talk about what you’re doing right now.  Yes – right now!  Ok, so the first couple of hundred thousand users are mostly people with too much time on their hands. 

But, recently I was at a conference attended by my industry peers, and I noticed people blogging to each other in real time about the sessions they were attending (and making lunch plans).   They called it “Twittering.” 

As Web 2.0 services continue to unfold (every day) a pattern has emerged.  The first batch of users is usually people who spend a lot of time online doing seemingly unimportant things.  I’m referring to consumers who are entertaining themselves as early adopters of the technology.  Then, as more and more people catch on (and fast) we’ve seen business professionals adopting social sites to create groups and networks for collaboration, conversations, knowledge management – real productive stuff! 

So, how will micro blogging become productive to business users?  Well, Google has already purchased Jaiku.  Apparently since there were only two major players in this space and Google is moving into the mobile communications space I’m guessing that Jaiku has very strong features in mobile communications. 

So, here’s one potential scenario in my crystal ball.  A sales and marketing team for a services or product company is dispersed througout a geographic region.  I can see how members of teams comprised of sales reps, engineers, specialists, product managers and line managers back at HQ would use micro blogging to discuss details about a sales situation RIGHT NOW!  In fact, I’ve been in meetings where the prospect asks a question and the team on site doesn’t have the answer right now (“we’ll get back to you on that.”)  But, with a quick micro-blogged note to someone on the extended team (to their cell phone if necessary) we can get the answer on the spot and probably within seconds.  Boy, I sure could’ve used that a few times in my career. 

Does this crystal ball application idea give you any practical ideas for micro blogging? 

I’m sure glad there are people who embrace new Web 2.0 technologies and give us ideas about ways to implement them in productive ways in our businesses.  I can hardly wait to hear about Google’s plans for Jaiku.  They’ve been quiet about it.  But, just wait and see.

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