Today at the iSan iSummit 2008, I presented a bit on twitter.

But the question became why?

Enthusiastically, I explain the ins and outs, many experiences from Learning 2.008 included.

Yet, I feel I was unable to get the entire jist of it across.

So here’s a few honest reasons why twitter may help you on your IT & Education equation.

1. IT and education people suck at connecting. Brutally honest? Maybe. Not necessarily true? Probably. But the truth is, a lot of us in IT don’t necessarily get the benefits and tiddlywinks that classroom teachers get with regard to things such as PD and conferences. And education-types are relatively sheltered compared to mass media, communications, finance and pretty much any other industry short of hermits and evil used car dealers (hyperbole, yes). Thus, when we do get our time in the sun, it’s a good opportunity to network. And twitter can help keep your garden green in the post-conference blues. Not as interpersonal as Facebook, over-professional like LinkedIn, embarrassingly direct like email or intrusive as spammy listservs, twitter has a charming balance of community, water cooler and timeliness of a blog.  Twitter is kind of like a big cafe (or bar… your choice). You sit around, listen to who you want to, and maybe jump in if you like the vibe.
2. It’s easier than wikis, blogs, SNSs, email and all them shishkabobs. Especially if you have twhirl (free, Adobe AIR crossplatform), twitterrific (not free), twitbin (Firefox plugin) or an iPhone with twitterrific. Twitter out of the box isn’t a great resource. Having a non-automatic refreshing window always open is a little cumbersome. But the little apps I’ve mentioned allow you to stay logged in and keep a relatively unobstructive window open for you. Like an RSS reader, you get to follow along when you want to. And all three will automatically refresh and even notify you of new messages and twits. If you suffer from ADD and are easily distracted, twitter may not be for you. But that comment is entirely in jest and I think most people can exploit these wonderful resources.
3. There are a lot of smart, active IT people out there for you to exploit collaborate with. Also in jest . But it’s true, there’s a lot of people out there that are worth listening and talking to. Some users that are worth the fare and more? Ewanmcintosh (Technology/Learning/Media guru), cogdog (Alan Levine, Vice President, NMC Community and CTO for the New Media Consortium), PresentationZen (Garr Reynolds, presenter extraordinare), Jutecht (Jeff Utecht, organizer of Learning 2.0 Shanghai & current Elementary Technology & Learning Coordinator at ISB), jennyluca (active IT librarian from Australia), jasonwelker (IT heavyweight economics teacher from Zurich International School), intrepidteacher (a progressive teacher in Doha), and many, many more. From the YIS family, we bring you BrianLockwood (Director of Information Technology), kurisuteen (Christine, MS/HS IT Facilitator), yislibrary (Brian Farrell, Librarian), AClarkYIS (Adam Clark, Student Life Counselor/Skate Revolutionary) and, of course, myself. In fact, we even tweet our meetings as minutes at yisitmeeting. I’m waiting for one of you to crash the meeting!

Still not convinced?
Just try it for a week. Make sure to get an account, get a client (twhirl, twitbin and TweetDeck are free and crossplatform) and follow some of the people mentioned.
And please, do jump in.