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COVER STORY
On his trip to the US in April, Gordon Brown was accompanied
by a twitterer who broadcast regular real-time tweets
An avid ‘twitterer’ himself, he says these new social media tools
bring a very disruptive effect to bear. “It is almost an inversion of
traditional models where you control communication,” he says.
“These tools really challenge that, creating a certain amount of
discomfiture in our profession. The reality though? Folks, get used
to it. We’re going to get an awful lot more of this, whether we like
it or not.”
For the uninitiated, Twitter is a social network and so-called
micro-blogging service, where users can send ‘tweets’ — 140-
character maximum messages — via the website, texts, instant
messaging and other applications. The messages are immed-
iately available online to those users who have chosen to ‘follow’
that particular twitterer. Hobson himself twittered throughout the
conference on his laptop, so his followers received real-time cov-
erage of the various speakers throughout the day. Today it has
spawned competitors like Jaiku, which was, incidentally, snapped
up by Google at the end of 2007 for an undisclosed sum.
I’ll have what they’re having
There are still those who think the likes of Twitter are just for the
die-hard bloggers or tech geeks, but if Google’s interest in the
area doesn’t convince you otherwise, did you know that CNN is
using Twitter to deliver breaking news? And, says Hobson, every
commercial broadcaster in the UK is now present on the network.
Those in the political lobbying field can’t have failed to notice that
campaigners in the US democratic race for nomination were busy
twittering in recent months. Number 10 Downing Street even has
es
its own channel on Twitter. On Gordon Brown’s recent US trip,
there was a twitterer with him at all times sending out tweets —
and all this communication outside of the official channels.
ess/Rex Featur
Hobson is almost evangelistic on the subject. He travels to
conferences all over the world with the aim of convincing his col-
leagues in the profession of the importance of keeping up to
speed on new online channels. “It’s changing how we practise
our profession, yet while I know loads of journalists who are
Photo by Sipa Pr
22 Marketing Age May/June ‘08
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