the twitter on twitter

well...if david pogue says twitter isn't the time-sucking, ego-driven, of-the-moment internet phenomenon it appears to be...then may i'll reconsider my stance.

my gripes aside, he does raise the same interesting point that boyd did in her article on blogging. namely, that twitter can be "precisely what you want it to be".

pogue defines his twitter as being useful for somethings that would not "merit a full blog or article post." to that i would say, 'does a blog really have to be that involved in order for you to consider posting it?'

having all of these technologies that do, essentially, the same thing (facebook's status message is comparable to a twitter feed, twitter feeds resemble short musings in a blog post...) seems redundant (eliminating redundancies is what i do. i've got the cataloger's gene.). i can justify having a facebook that displays personal information within a network of people who are likely to need that information (it's been a helpful tool for making dinner/drink dates with old friends. whether or not they showed up for those meetings is another story all together.) in addition to having a blog where i upload content (something more involved than that status message). they connect me to people in different ways.  the facts are on facebook (name, location, phone, email. leave a brief comment at the sound of the tone), the thoughts are on the blog (the who, what, where, when and why of my life. no character limit).

but, it looks like i've just talked myself into a corner trying to define what these technologies are. in trying to make them distinct things, i've uncovered that, yes, they can be anything.

sticker books don't count

"the campaign for a commercial-free childhood" is mounting a campaign against scholastic inc. saying that book clubs (the single best part of elementary school) should not market video games and other non-book items in their monthly fliers.

susan linn, director of the campaign, says, "The message that children get when books are marketed with other items is that a book in and of itself isn’t enough. And what it does is encourage children to choose books based not on the content but on what they get with it.” (emphasis mine)

judy newman, president of scholastic book clubs counters by saying that "books sold with small items like stickers to help engage children who 'may not be traditional readers.' "

sounds like a good pedagogical brawl is in the works! in one corner: heavy weight james "literacy comes in a variety of  forms" gee. in the other: neil "books are always better" postman.

round one: ding ding.