Twitter This

Today, I offered my writing and reporting students this extra credit opportunity: Live tweet the presidential debates this Friday. So far, two students have signed on with Twitter, and I sense others will do it too.

On this same note, the newspaper staff has decided to turn a camera on the newsroom tonight and will post it later on The Skyline View web site. Jokingly, I said that since that was the case, I was going to live tweet (is that an oxymoron?) from the newsroom floor today. And I started too.

But you see, this is my first time using Twitter. I signed up during the Democratic Convention to be able to more closely follow Slate's coverage--but it was only today that I started posting and following others. The interesting thing is, though, that once you follow someone else, it seems they will, in turn, follow you. I am not a Facebook or MySpace user (yet). So, this was very unexpected.

And now, I feel so exposed. This is interesting territory for me, this line between the private, public, and extreme public realms. I'm used to having my web page (which I am now, by the way, having problems with) and this blog. But Twitter feels more personal, more immediate.