Actor Anderson Cooper was on the Kelly and Regis show this morning discussing twittering. Not only were they discussing twittering, he was twittering during the show. Kelly Ripa  admitted she doesn’t Tweet.  I think it’s time now that she learns how to twitter.  Anderson not only is a twitter fan, but has  221,110 people following him. He actually used his phone to twitter during the show.  

Twitter applications have been developed to help you manage your twitter friends. I’ve read and heard about a lot of applications, but the one I like the best is called TweetDeck and you can download it from TweetDeck.com.  To the left you will see Anderson Cooper’s profile that you can access from TweetDeck.

What is fun about TweetDeck is that it has a tracking capability that let’s you track certain people or keywords that people are talking about.  It gives you 10 columns to use. For each column, you choose what you want to appear in that column.

For example, if you want to create a group of people that you know personally you can see what they are saying and their comments are all listed in one column. If you are tracking what people say about Iphones, you can choose that as a keyword and have a column for all the tweets about Iphones.

The reason that is fun is because you can then begin conversations with people who are talking about things you are interested in. In the photo below, you can see a sample of TweetDeck. I am only showing two columns because of space limitations, but you can have up to ten. There is a slide bar at the bottom of the application that let’s you quickly view all of the columns. You can also change your groups whenever you want. 

Tweetdeck is free and very addicting. Be prepared to have a whole new world of friends. My twitter name is bluewaves1.  Join me in twittering today.

Let me know what your favorite Twitter application is by making a comment here.

The statistics in the chart below were taken from the website, www.twitterholic.com. They have measured 1000 Twitter users and recorded information about them.  The Twitter URL for each person or company has been included for ease of use and to encourage people to check out just what is driving this rapid growth. By clicking on the URL, you can easily follow these companies or people on Twitter. If you want to increase your Twitter followers, follow these people.

Just for fun, I analyzed Guy Kawasaki’s statistics. I guess I’m somewhat of a statistics freak. He increased his Twitter followers by 608 people a day for 45 days. If you visit his site listed on his Twitter page, you can see that he has a datafeed or aggregator of some kind that is posting for him, but he also posts himself. His Twitter influence is rapidly growing.

Brian Campbell recommends that in order to grow your Twitter followers, you find people who also reciprocate and follow other people back. With that in mind, the list below shows the top twenty Tweeps (people who use Twitter) that follow other people. Increase your Twitter followers by following these people.

 Join the growing number of people who are using Twitter.com.  In fact, follow me on Twitter and we’ll have a great time. You can always comment below and leave your Twitter address to increase your followers!

According to Om Malik,

“Twitter is a micro-messaging service that has caught the imaginations of everyone from tech mommies to cable news networks, sports stars and Hollywood stars. It has become the source of breaking news and rumors.”

A twitter is an instant text message from a cell phone or computer. A twitter is a sentence that is less than 140 characters long. It’s a short, but sweet message, like a chirp from a bird. The purpose of a twitter is to tell someone what your latest thoughts or activities have been. Twitter messages can be read from a mobile phone or the internet. You need to set up an account at Twitter.com to use this service.

Who gets your twitter messages?

Someone that you have asked to follow your messages or that has asked you if they can follow you. You can have no followers or you can have thousands of followers. It’s all up to you.

Websites such as twitterholic.com will tell you what people or organizations have the most number of followers. CNN Breaking News has the most number of followers (437,573) which makes sense. People can get breaking news on their cell phones when the stories are released. President Barack Obama has the most number of friends (374,715) however, he has not made any posts since he became President.

What is a tweep?

Tweeps are people who receive your twitter messages. You too can become a tweep.

Who invented Twittering?

Twittering, commonly referred to as micro-blogging or micro-messaging was the brain child of Jack Dorsey. He started a company that was using software for emergency dispatch couriers, taxis, and emergency services from the web. He and Isaac Stone, they wrote Twitter’s prototype, using instant text messaging, in about two weeks. They took their ideas to a company called Odeo and teamed up with Evan Williams, well known for his role in Blogger, one of the first web applications for creating and managing blogs. They launched Twitter Inc., and three years later Twitter has approximately 5 million users. In February of 2009, they received a buyout offer of $500M. 

Who cares about your tweets?

This depends on you. If you are a witness to an earthquake, a fire or other natural disaster, you may be the key to notifying people about the emergency situation. You may save lives by your quick thinking and quick messaging.  You might come across an article that you love and want to tell people about.  If you can type your message in 140 characters or less, you can tell all of your followers about it. If you find that the url you want to announce is too long, go to tinyurl.com and make it shorter.  Have you read a good book lately?  Gone to a good movie? Gone to a horrible movie?  Let others know about it. Tweet it! See the bird below this post? Baby boomer tweeps are invited to click on this link and share this post. You can follow my tweets by going to twitter.com