IM meets blogging. Quick, text-based way to get out information. Twitter is one widely used Micro-blog. "The content of a micro-blog differs from a traditional blog due in that it is typically more topical, smaller in aggregate file size (e.g. text, audio or video) but is the same in that people utilize it for both business and individual reasons. Many micro-blogs provide this short commentary on a person-to-person level, or share news about a company's products and services". See more at wikipedia.com Micro-blogging.  Twitter is a free social networking and micro-blogging service that allows its users to send and read other users' updates (otherwise known as tweets), which are text-based posts of up to 140 characters in length. Updates are displayed on the user's profile page and delivered to other users who have signed up to receive them. The sender can restrict delivery to those in his or her circle of friends (delivery to everyone being the default). Users can receive updates via the Twitter website, instant messaging, SMS, RSS, email or through an application such as Twitterrific or Facebook. Potential Uses
Sample Guidelines, Policies and Further Reading
Examples:
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Micro-blogging |
The City of Arvada, CO setup a Twitter account in August. We push our headlines and rss feeds to our Twitter account to share information. In just a few days most of the local TV and newspapers starting following the account. It is just another way to automate the pushing of information. I'm attaching a white paper written by Arvada'a Web Project Manager, Sean Hudson, explaining the tool for Department heads, staff and elected officials. It notes the links that Joseph Morris stated above and also talks about the use of Twitter as a customer service tool. Come follow us www.twitter.com/cityofarvada
See the file attachment above for the white paper - Michele
How about Yammer?
Yammer is like Twitter if you want one more controlled for for internal use. It verifies you have a valid email address of the site you create based upon your gov (or corporate) email. It provides the same blackberry download options, profiles, and methods to view the miniblogs online, via mobile or in an email summary sent to you. (Which I thought was an interesting use of email ??) Haven't quite figured out the value of this above Twitter...but exploring. Diane Gardner (Mesa, Az)
Looks like the Mosman Council in Australia is using a Twitter Account to interact with citizens. Might be worth keeping track of: http://twitter.com/Mosmancouncil
We use Twitter with the Town of Blacksburg: http://twitter.com/Blacksburg_Gov
We use the RSS feed from the news part of our website to post links directly, but we also try to get a little creative and fun with our Tweets.
Ottawa, Canada now has a twitter feed (since Dec 08) @ottawacity to share our News Releases, Press Releases, and Media Advisories.
Just thought this might be of interest to those that follow Twitter. The Va General Assembly members are now using this this technology with some unintended consequences. See http://campaignspot.nationalreview.com/post/?q=NmYzNTk3OTQ0NzNiMjk2ZjA1OTU5MmFhM2I3Y2EyZjg= or http://tpmdc.talkingpointsmemo.com/2009/02/virginia-gop-chairmans-blog-outreach-massive-fail.php Apparantly Twitter is really making the decision making process much more transparent to everyone.
Last night @localgovchat hosted an online Twitter chat for local govies. Most of the chat related to Web 2.0 topics. Here is a link to the transcript: http://localgovchat.files.wordpress.com/2010/03/lgc_transcript_03_03_10.pdf
Survey of Official & Unofficial Law Enforcement Twitter Accounts in Canada, the UK, and the US: http://www.scribd.com/doc/36761664/Survey-of-Official-Unofficial-Law-Enforcement-Twitter-Accounts-in-Canada-the-United-Kingdom-the-United-States