The hard thing about taking cheap shots at Richmond BizSense's founder for his "Why I still hate Twitter" commentary earlier this week is that he might not like blogs either. That's why I'm spending my energy on constructive things, like pointing people in the direction of some reasonably cogent blog posts about why Twitter might actually serve a purpose or three in the universe known as Richmond's news industry.
[For the record, let it be known that @MattDiNardo of TV8 was first out the gate early Monday morning with predictions for a GIGANTIC SNOWSTORM this weekend. On Twitter. Of course, the bread I bought that morning is now stale.]
At any rate, it seems like the entire staff of The Hodges Partnership (THP) received a homework assignment after Kremer let loose: Go write a blog post about how Kremer can use Twitter.
First up, co-founder Jon Newman, who founded Twitter from his office on the second floor of the McDonald's at 18th and Broad streets. In his "open letter" to Kremer, Newman offered some advice for the errant newsman, including building a "core Twitter posse". Which is what all of us really want out of life.
As always, the comments sections of blog posts are often where the real meat is manufactured. Such is the case with Jon's post.
Newman's advice was followed by a blog post from Tony Scida, the guy whose last name I can never pronounce. A new member of the THP team, Tony was obviously looking to score points from the boss. Regardless of his motivation, he offered some great perspectives on the value of Twitter:
Whether Aaron realizes it or not, his web site is an example of social media. When he left Media General, he could have gone off and started a print business paper. And he might have been successful. But, he chose to use the blog format, letting readers post comments on every story. We all know that comments can be a mixed bag, but hosting discussions has proved to be a Good Thing™ for many site owners. In the halcyon days of blogging, you could count on most of the discussion about your posts to happen in the comments and trackbacks. But today, much of that discussion is happening off of our sites and on social media platforms.
If you aren’t actively monitoring Twitter, you may want to find another way to engage that off-domain discussion. One way would be to use a plugin that shows Twitter discussions about your articles in the comments section. Many active Twitter users are compulsive content generators who like having their own platform to react to the world. If I comment on my Twitter stream, I know most of my followers will see it, but when I comment on your site, I don’t know who will see it and I might not see the responses. RBS already has comments and trackbacks, and this could be a way to encourage even more discussion.
Of course, Kremer isn't the point here. He's done exceptionally well with his new venture, and is providing a great news resource for a news-starved city (that doesn't want to pay for news, apparently). But the dialogue sparked on Twitter and through the local blogs about his column are a great demonstration of how social media can push conversations deeper, further, faster and better.
