Get Tweeting!

Here is part 3 of my series on how movement conservatives are using Twitter today.

In part 1 of my series, I introduced Twitter, a relatively new text messaging service that combines features of many previously-existing Internet messaging technologies into one new way of connecting and communicating.

In part 2 of my series, I went into more detail about Twitter features, and gave some examples of how Twitter is being used by Hugh Hewitt and other activists.

Conservatives on Twitter

• Part 1
• Part 2
• Part 3 (This post)

So how do you get started on Twitter? There are nearly as many ways to use Twitter as there are Twitter users. That's what makes it so powerful, but it also makes it difficult to explain to Twitter novices.

First, go to www.twitter.com and create a Twitter account. You can use just about anything for a user name. Use your real name, a brand like a web site or blog, or something completely obscure, depending on how easily you want to be found, and how you will be using Twitter. Learn how to use hashtags (like #hhrs) on search.twitter.com.

Second, use Twitter for a week or two to figure out the basic Twitter commands and functions, and to understand how others are using Twitter. Check out this Twitter 101 Guide by David All Group.

One of the mysterious Twitter-related things you should learn about is TinyURL. TinyURL is one of several URL redirection-abbreviator services that shortens URLs so you can more easily include hyperlinks in your 140-character Tweets. To use TinyURL, visit the site, enter a long URL, and almost immediately you get a TinyURL to copy-paste into your Tweet. This technique is also useful for including hyperlinks in e-mails, which sometimes renders long URLs nonfunctional with line breaks.

Last, find the people with Twitter accounts whom you know and care about, and Follow them. Notice who they are Following. Here is a list to get you started:

• Top Conservatives on Twitter - required reading of the moment, don't miss the "10 Things You Can Do." Here's my TCOT stats profile
• Tweet Congress - find out who's Tweeting in the people's house
• GovTwit - an updated listing of bureaucrats, reporters, and politicos on Twitter, very interesting list that runs from the famous to the esoteric, state and local (R.T. Rybak) to the international (UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon).


• Hugh Hewitt (hughhewitt)
• Michelle Malkin (michellemalkin)
• True North (looktruenorth)
• Rebuild The Party (rebuildtheparty)
• Minnesota Free Market Institute (MNFreeMktInst)
• Ed Morrissey (EdMorrissey)
• Politics in Minnesota (PoliticsMN)
• Matt Abe (mattabe) - in addition to standard Tweets, I have used TwitterFeed to post the title of my North Star Liberty blog posts as Tweets. Many media outlets are also doing this with their RSS feeds.

Before long, you'll "get" Twitter, and gradually tailor your use of the service to inform, connect, and communicate as you like it. Welcome to the Twitterverse.

Putting Twitter to work

Here is part 2 of my series on how movement conservatives are using Twitter today.

Twitter is basically a text messaging service, but with several refinements that make it more powerful for social networking and as a tool for, pardon the expression, change. I'll explain what makes Twitter different from, and similar to, other online communication tools you've used. Then I'll cite some interesting applications that Hugh Hewitt and others are using right now to connect with others and strengthen the conservative movement.

Conservatives on Twitter

• Part 1
• Part 2 (this post)
• Part 3

First, with Twitter you can send messages in three different modes:

• Broadcast, to all Twitter users (the least useful for our purposes)
• Public chat (Reply), again visible to all subscribers, but also sent directly to a user identified by his or her user name in the format "@username"
• Direct, one-to-one, sent privately to the user in the format "D username;" just like instant messaging (IM) or SMS text messaging

Second, with Twitter you receive messages as you like them:

• Every Tweet sent by every user (again, the least useful for our purposes)
• Friends only, so you only see Tweets from users you are Following
• Search by hashtag (#tag); see examples below
• Browse on a user's homepage (http://www.twitter.com/username)
• Direct one-to-one, exchanging D messages (see above)

And last, you can use Twitter on any combination of mobile and PC platforms:

• The Twitter.com web site
• Internet browser plug-in
• Desktop app
• IM plug-in (AOL, Yahoo, MSN, etc.)
• Cell phone SMS (text message)
• iPhone
• Blackberry

With this unique combination of features, imaginative Twitter users have cooked up some interesting applications:

Hugh Hewitt has defined a hashtag #hhrs for the Hugh Hewitt Radio Show. Tweets that include #hhrs will show up when users search for it at search.twitter.com. This enables listeners to get lists of show guests before each show, communicate with Hewitt and his producers, discuss the show's topics, and read all of the Tweets posted after the show is over.

This can be easily repeated by other talk radio shows, and has been by Hewitt's protégés on AM 1280 The Patriot: David Strom and Margaret Martin (#davidstrom), John Hinderaker, Chad the Elder, and Brian Ward (#narn), and King Banaian and Michael Brodkorb (#narn2). This practice broadens the participation and interaction in these shows way beyond those who get past the call screeners.

Conservative activists across the country are finding (and Following) each other on the new web site Top Conservatives on Twitter. This idea should spawn regional or local lists like True North Conservatives on Twitter (does not exist yet).

Activists on both sides are following the ballot recount in the U.S. Senate race by seaching on #mnrecount. Attendees and onlookers kept up with the recent Republican National Convention by searching on #rnc08.

News outlets (foxnewspolitics) and web sites (looktruenorth) are publishing their RSS feeds in Twitter.

Why Twitter matters to us now

Twitter is a multi-platform, Internet-based social networking/microblogging service that combines features of instant messaging, chat, blogs, and RSS.

The preceding sentence was provided as a public service to web-savvy individuals unfamiliar with Twitter, who were waiting impatiently for a technically concise definition of this trendy new technology. For the rest of you wanting to know why conservatives are all atwitter, read on.

Conservatives on Twitter

• Part 1 (this post)
• Part 2
• Part 3

The conservative Twitter train is leaving the station, and Hugh Hewitt is driving it. The self-described "center right" radio talk show host introduced many to the political applications of blogs. He is the godfather of the local Northern Alliance of Blogs, helping to make national media figures out of James Lileks, Power Line, "Captain" Ed Morrissey, and a Saturday radio/Internet stream lineup with other Northern Alliance bloggers on AM 1280 The Patriot and UStream.tv.

Shortly after Election Day, Hewitt joined numerous conservative activists within and outside the Republican party in a postmortem analysis that quickly turned technological. Since then, Hewitt created a Facebook account and began experimenting with various applications of Twitter, while documenting his findings and interviewing new media consultants almost daily on his radio show (tune in today, and catch up with Hugh's podcasts on TownHall.com).

Especially since Thanksgiving, conservatives have started to flock to Twitter, led by Hewitt and web sites like Top Conservatives on Twitter and Rebuild the Party. Conservative commentator and blogger Michelle Malkin reactivated her largely dormant Twitter account, now "Tweeting" (posting in Twitter parlance) several times daily. Some of us (myself included) created our Twitter accounts because Hewitt told us to, and proceeded to experiment and learn right along with him.

Why does Twitter matter to political activists, on a desktop or smart phone already crowded with web sites, blogs, RSS feeds, e-mail accounts, IMs and text messages? The answer is in the unique applications made possible by Twitter's deceptively simple format, open architecture, and the creative minds of its users.