Twitter: Social tool or annoying fad?

Do people really need to know what you ate for breakfast? Jamie Hanton investigates.

Globally, Twitter gives you the ear of "VIPs", helps struggling freedom fighters and lets you in on the most highly prized secrets of Tammy from Arizona.

Yes, that's right, she had ketchup for breakfast. No, not on anything. Just ketchup.

But what about here in New Zealand? What does the NZ Twitterverse freeze over for? Natural disasters for one. New Zealand was trending highly after the recent 7.8 Milford quake, also, Twitter was instrumental in reporting Jeff Goldblum's faux death while filming up north.

But aside from the earth-shaking events mentioned above, how do New Zealanders interact with Twitter? A good place to start if you're new to Twitter and want to find other Kiwi users is the New Zealand Twibe page (twibes.com/ group/NewZealand).

A Twibe, is Twingo for a Twitter Tribe. And just so you know, it's possible to relate anything to Twitter by adding a Tw prefix. I just made Twingo up. Twagic.

The New Zealand Twibe currently has 484 members. The comparable page on Facebook, for fans of New Zealand, has more than 70,000 members. Even though the Twibe does not cover the gamut of New Zealand Twusers, it is still an accurate reflection of the relative paucity of Kiwis using Twitter.

And therein lies the problem. Critical mass has not been reached, yet. Thus, one of the serendipitous beauties of Twitter rarely occurs - "I'm just in The Twisted Hop having a beer" tweet, from whence a barrage of replies come stating that your followers are around the area and are on their way to join you.

Despite this, the New Zealand Twitter community is both tight knit and open to newcomers. There is a hearty neighbourly feeling, though some centres are more active than others. Christchurch is slightly on the inactive side of real life gatherings, otherwise known as Tweet-ups, events where Twitterers with things in common get together, whereas Wellington and Auckland seem to hum with the sound of constant tweeting and meeting.

It should be noted that for what we lack in offline action we make up for with the high-quality of Christchurch Twitterers.

We have Art Blogger @CherylBernstein, DJ in full effect @edmuzik, writer @AdrienneRewi, Icelandic/Kiwi singing sensation @herasings, and playwright @samnzed to name a few. To find countrywide Twitterers check out We Follow (http://wefollow.com/ twitter/kiwi), which ranks users according to how many followers they have. Currently top ranking is Air New Zealand's Grabaseat Twitter account, which posts the newest grabaseat deals each day.

How is it that the top Twitterer in New Zealand is a business account? Where is our Oprah? Our Ashton Kutcher? Really, we should be thankful for the inherently laid back, reserved Kiwi attitude that has perhaps stifled Twitter's transformation into an inane popularity gauge as it has in other locales.

In a straw pole I conducted, the majority of respondents were anti-Twitter. Christchurch Twitter user Tim Powell says he goes through stages of Twitter but "most of the time I just have nothing to say that anyone would care about." Similarly, another Christchurch user compared Twitter to an ego-stroking marathon.

While widespread adoption seems a long distance away in New Zealand there is no doubt that Twitter has value, especially among those involved in creative, media and technology industries. It is certainly on the sharper side of the cutting edge than other social media applications.

Like all communities, effort put in invariably reflects the quality of outcomes. New Zealand Twitterers are a unique community, and engaging and communicating with others in a genuine way always has its own rewards. Any feedback to @JamieHanton.

7 REASONS TO HATE TWITTER

1. Constant evangelising by techies coupled with the suggestion that Twitter can solve world peace. Funnily enough, Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg said the same thing of Facebook last year.

2. Users indulging in self- aggrandisement. Arrogance is arrogance. The song remains the same across media.

3. Quotes from "famous" people masquerading as meaningful sentences. Blame the 140 characters for this.

4. Not knowing when to use the reply or direct-message function. Use the direct-message function to ask your husband to pick up milk on his way home. We do not need to know this.

5. Social marketing "gurus" - follower collectors and businesses that have decided to use Twitter as another advertising channel. Symmetrical communication? Too hard. Let's just spam people.

6. Banal, served without a twist of lemon.

7. Affixing "Tw" to everything.

- © Fairfax NZ News