Twitter has been a popular subject in class. As we twitter on the debate, and then debate about the twitter. One question comes to mind. What, if any, is the practical use of twitter. I think we could all agree for our debate function, a chat log would work just as well, if not better. I would think that most could agree knowing your friends every move isn't exactly what i would call productive.

 This is where Yammer comes in. The people over at Geni, (a genealogy/family tree web sight) have created a business model of Twitter. Where twitter asked 'What are you doing?', Yammer asks 'What are you working on?'. Yammer has a bit of a different style, but still has twitter written all over it, in it's, graphics, setup and flow. There is one key difference between the two other than "what are you working on", and that is in the networking. The key to this style of net working comes straight from the ground floor of Facebook. Yammer uses the origin of your email to link you up with the other people that share a similar email. For example if I used my school email, my feed would display what everyone else was doing for work in my company(school).

 The key to this is the First.Last@hws.edu email setup. If you don't have an hws.edu email your out of luck. This will (in theory) allows people contained in the same business to know what each other are working on. This could lead to some real productivity gains. Where business is transparent to it self and the problem of two people working on the same thing can be solved. Will this ever take off? Only time will tell. Certainly in the next coming months a common Yammer post my be 'Looking for a new job.....'

Here is a link to a New York Times article on YAMMER

It’s not often that I listen to the radio…

…And even more rarely do I listen to NPR…

..... But there I was in my car, a few short steps from the entrance of my house… 20mins after I had arrived…. Stranded listening to Terry Gross interview James Bamford. The author of a new book called The Shadow factory a book about the government and eavesdropping on every day American citizens… How telecommunications companies have cloak and dagger style agreements with the government in which they sell our conversations to the NSA. James Bamford claims that secret offices in all major communication industries funnel data into the government’s hands, unrestricted. He claims that or privacy is slipping through our grasps… He describes the Shadow Factory, a plethora of sub-contracted privet companies who sift through the NSA’s ill-gotten goods…information, more importantly our information. These companies operate in immunity, a certain immunity that does not originate anywhere in the constitution….

“The mother of all watch lists is on a dell computer in the basement of the national counter intelligence center, and this computer is not even compatible with the NSA and CIA computer data bases.”

 Listening to the interview gives one a shocking face slap of reality about how our constitutional rights are crumbling under the convince of technology and behind the curtain of national defense.

 I am not entirely sure I will get a chance to read the book, but I know that listening to the interview gave me a look into some of the major themes. I would suggest anyone interested in the subject of surveillance should do the same the interview is available at.. NPR

I thought the Twiiter experiment was interesting, although i don't feel i got the full affect of the process. I was not able to be at a computer and had to "Tweet" by phone rather than online where I could see other peoples comments. Looking back at my feed I am able to more remember the things that stuck out in my mind during the debate. Somethings were political, where some others were more just commentary. When I first created my twitter I made one friend that has stuck with me through and through, Barrack Obama. He twitters to me about once a day, which is forwarded to my phone. I have a constant track on his movements around the country. recently I have been able to track him around, moving from Abington, PA (community gathering) to a "Change We Need" rally in Asheville, NC.