Use Twitter as a post-production forum 04/07/11

 

Tired of hoping and praying that someone will get around to answering your question on a forum?  Twitter is like forums on steroids.  There are thousands of people talking shop everyday – all day (and night).  And these are people that can be a resource for you (and vice versa).

 

Twitter is a great interactive research tool.  You can poll your followers about new technology that you are thinking about using.

 

 

8 minutes later (hopefully) and the comments start trickling in

 

 

And similar to using Twitter as a research tool, is using Twit Pic to post screenshots of settings that you have questions about.

 

 

To do this, first take a screenshot of the error message you need help with.

 

 

Next, go to  twitpic.com.  You will then be able to sign in using your Twitter account info:

 

 

 

After logging in, you will be able to upload your picture

 

 

 

After you upload the screenshot, type your Tweet.

 

 

Twit Pic will now upload your picture and message to Twitter.  Your Twitter followers will see the following image in their Tweet stream:

 

 

When they click on the Twit Pic link they will be redirected to Twit Pic where they will see the following image:

 

 

 

Having an image increases the chance that you will be able to get helpful advice.  (Note: Twit Pic also accepts video up to 10 mb in size and 1:30 in length).

 

Your followers will of course respond with an @ reply.  And what’s cool is that in Tweetdeck your @ replies can be viewed as a list.  This way you’ll have an archive of all the questions you got answered on Twitter.

 

Tips:

This is just the tip of the iceberg for having a dialogue with your peers on Twitter.  See the Tweetdeck hack to find out how to really extend the functionality of Twitter.

 

 

(Twitter icon by Design Mirkku)