If you were finally getting around to setting up a profile on Facebook so you can be part of the latest new web crew, forget it. All the cool kids have moved to Twitter! Of course I’m being a little sarcastic . Facebook and blogs and podcasts are still going strong. It’s just that Twitter is growing in leaps and bounds. It’s the latest next big thing! 

Twitter is a micro-blogging, SMS (short message service) IM, texting service, social network kind of thing.  

In their own words: 

“Twitter is a service for friends, family, and co–workers to communicate and stay connected through the exchange of quick, frequent answers to one simple question: What are you doing?”

There is a growth in the reasons why people use twitter as well as a whack of companion services to go along with it. Mobile apps, website widgets, tweet managers and search tools. You can even find out who swears the most on Twitter and what the most popular swear words of the moment are. Whew! It’s hard to keep up.

What’s not so cool is the fact that one of Twitters greatest gifts to the world – instant tweet updates via mobile devices (cell phones) is not available in Canada. Due to the high cost of sending text messages through Canadian tele-coms, introduced in the fall of 2008, Twitter has stopped sending updates – yours and other twitterati – to your cell/smart phone. You can send an update via text/sms but you need to go to the web to see what others are tweeting about. That sure takes some of the fun out of Twitter but people are finding ways around it.

Follow me and I’ll follow you! Send me a tweet at: www.twitter.com/deanKowen

Dean