LifeDev

There’s a great post by Kathy Sierra on the effects of being “always connected” with applications like email, IM and more specifically Twitter. For those of you who don’t know, Twitter is a service that allows you to tell the world what you’re doing all the time. It’s like a tiny blog letting people know what you’re up to.

Kathy argues that Twitter just may be the tipping point that sends us all to the loony bin. Personally, I’m on the fence on this one.

I could see where Twitter could be somewhat useful to businesses, as sort of a “I’m working on X” to inform of your progress or “Step Off: I’m working on something CRUCIAL!” to keep people away. With all the talk about business transparency, this could be something killer. If you really want to involve your users in a “behind-the-scenes” look at what you’re doing, Twitter could be a killer app. “We’re fixing X problem” or “working on this widget”.

An even better use would be if your site was running slow or something, and you could walk-the users through in real-time what was happening, the updates that were being made, and when it was fixed. But is it too much information for the general public to digest?

The real question to me is “Who really cares?”. I mean, apparently people do care. But the thing I think that needs to be evaluated is whether or not it benefits you. If knowing what Julie in accounting is doing right now is helpful to what you’re working on, then use it. But otherwise, it’s just going to be one more distraction that ruins your focus, and steals your flow.

If you’re wanting to become an expert at something, it turns out the best way to do it isn’t gobbling up all the knowledge you can possibly find. That just makes you knowledgable. No, if you’re wanting to become an expert at something, you’ve got to learn how to focus. To quote Kathy,

The brain scientists now tell us that becoming an expert is not a matter of being a prodigy, it’s a matter of being able to focus.

In short: if Twitter (or any other app) keeps you from focusing, then don’t use it. Keeping focus is the single most important thing you should be worried about. If you’re focused, everything else will fall into place.

I’ve only come up with one example of how to utilize Twitter in a positive way. I’m sure there are many others. Feel free to give your tips below.

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