The Relevance of Twitter

Twitter, whether you like it or not, is relevant. It is also a hell of a lot of fun, but more on that later.

I didn't much understand the importance of twitter until recently. I enjoyed it, don't get me wrong - where else can you berate your friends with your humor? Where else can you win free screenings (I did, by the way - win tickets to a Paramount screening of Paranormal Activity)? Where else can you @ your friends? Twitter is a lot of fun for writers and for people who like to hear themselves talk. I am both of these things.

But relevant in my business? I never would have really guessed. Sure I would have stood by twitter and said "you can follow companies" to try and make it seem like something more than Facebook - but really, what did I know?

And then the Hollywood Fringe Festival happened. Hash tags (more in a bit) popped up like mad. #HFF from everyone associated and tweeting about the festival. And it worked. Suddenly we were bound. We could find and follow each other. We helped each other with costumes. We advertised our shows. We discussed venues and shared rehearsal pictures. We whored out the reviews we wrote (well.... I did). We were, in a sense, a mini online community. The festival was spread out, but twitter brought us together. I "met" other artists and writers and reviewers on twitter and then met them in real life. And it's not weird at all.

Hell, I got my job writing for the LA Theatre Review because someone posted it on twitter. Twitter makes things happen.

Reasons you should believe in twitter:

1) Like Myspace in the end, people want followers. Where in Facebook I will only accept friend requests from people I know, twitter allows you to follow anyone (whether they follow you back is another story entirely) but once following - you can mention (@) them in your tweets. It is much easier to connect to people you don't know yet, effectively building up your network, on twitter.

2) Hash tags (#LAThtr) instantly connect groups. Sure people tag things like #fail, but it works to unite communities as well. The LA Theatre scene has started to utilize twitter because of it's successful contribution to the fringe festival.

3) Jobs get posted on twitter. There are users you can follow that post job openings. You can follow people in the industry who might tweet job openings. Believe me, it happens. Just the other day I started following a woman (@cindymariej) who shares career advice to her followers and offers a weekly mailing of entertainment job openings.

4) As I mentioned before, you can follow companies on twitter. They post about what they're up to and what they want to be up to. I'm following every studio on twitter, and while it's often shameless self promotion of their latest action film, there often are tweets about the inner workings of the company as well. People hear things on twitter. It is often quoted. Hell, half the Emmy nominee reactions were quotes pulled from the nominee's twitter account.

5) In a world of instant news, twitter is the fastest. Earthquake? You'll know about it on twitter. Prop 8 trial won't allow cameras in? How about a live tweet from the courtroom. It happened and let all of us interested in the trial capable of following it (and not when its days old news).

So there you have it: my love letter to twitter. So the next time someone tries to tell you its just a string of status updates, slap them in the face with my blog.

And follow me on twitter - @marcusbkaye.