Fresno Famous

Have you tried Tweetdeck? I think it's really cool. It's like having the regular Twitter feed, but with added rows so you can see different Tweets divided up into multple rows. The first time I saw it was some months ago on CNN. They had it up on one of those huge monitors in the studio. It was kind of dazzling and I went online and downloaded the software.

It's a free-standing window that's separate from your regular web browser. It's owned and operated by Twitter and it looks real cool on a big monitor as each new tweet pops up in real time. Like computerized social popcorn. Each row can be set up to be whatever you want it to be, but Twitter's default set-up of rows is:

Row 1: Your regular Twitter feed.

Row 2: Al Tweets where your name was mentioned. This comes in handy because there are times when someone mentioned you but you missed it for some reason, and by the time you got on Twitter that Tweet that mentioned you fell so far down the list as to become almost invisible.

Row 3: All your direct messages through Twitter.

Row 4: Twiiter recommends.

Row 5: Trending Worldwide topics.

http://www.tweetdeck.com/

I don't think Tweetdeck is quite as usefull for smartphones or tablets as for a PC because the multiple rows are easier to read on a large screen. But, they do have Tweetdeck apps for those devices.

Friday afternoons are the best. When your Twitter followers/followees are wrapping up their week and Tweeting about a conclusion to things past and anticipation of things future it really starts jumping. With the sound on there's a pleasant little bleep with each new Tweet. It's exciting to watch all the people interact with each other across the Tweetdeck.

Sure got me thinking about expanding that list of 'following'. I think it goes like this: You follow somebody you like and then you hope they will follow you. The way to get a lot of followers is to go follow a lot people. I like comedians like Garry Shandling, Bill Maher and Harry Shearer. But, they're not real friends. A mixture of real friends, aquaintances and celebrities I guess is a good way to go.

Those comedians I mentioned usually don't say anything unless it's something important. Or, at least that's the impression I get. But, then there's some who are constatntly tweeting all day every day. Man, they better have something interesting about their life to make me that interested in what they do. I follow a couple of political activists/speakers/writers that live pretty darn exciting lives. Markos Molitsas of Daily Kos: https://twitter.com/#!/markos and Mona Eltahawy writer for the UK GUardian: https://twitter.com/#!/monaeltahawy

Locally I follow Bill McEwen and other Bee writers and The Fresnan and Abigail Nolte among others.

Makes me think about the variety of online relationships vs. real friends. And the inherent nature of the net to be used as a marketplace of both goods and ideas.