Quebec Valley

Although I rarely use Twitter, I see it’s value and I wish I had more time to use it. One of the problems is there is a lot of “noise”.

If you think about it, Twitter is really like a big IRC server having just one personalised channel. The difference is that conversations in IRC are “real time” and require immediate attention. In Twitter, you ignore conversations coming from strangers (actually you don’t see them) and you read your friend’s conversations. This is not very efficient because what if someone (you don’t know obviously) is having a very interesting conversation with one of your contacts?

How can you gain from this? How can you get involved in this conversation? Perhaps you are an expert and would like to participate in this exchange? Should Twitter move away from the “follower” architecture and move to a “group” architecture? Trust might be an issue. Do you trust people you follow more than strangers in a group you trust? Perhaps. Do you trust your friend’s friends (which are complete strangers to you) more than complete strangers? Probably.

If you’re like me, you try to follow a bunch of people you think will have same ideas, thoughts or hobbies as you do, right? You probably follow people who are Internet savvy, who like politics, you like cats and so on because you probably read their blogs or know them in real life.

Doesn’t it sound just like IRC channels? You join the channels you like and (try to) follow a bunch of conversations? In IRC, you’re not a “friend” of anyone and you don’t follow anyone. You are in multiple groups and there are no relations between individuals.

Same goes in real life. You are in groups. Work, school, friends and neighbors are all groups you belong to. Just like IRC, some people come in and leave your groups.

So is Twitter just a big IRC server after all? If so, will we see integration with Identi.ca and Facebook in the future?

If Twitter is just a big IRC server, why is it worth that much? :)