Facebook and Twitter

For some reason I woke up at the ridiculous hour of 4 am.  Aside from having Chopin's Revolutionary Etude running through my head, I was thinking about past relationships and future relationships.  I also was thinking about my adventures with using social media.  Which brings me to my topic of the day.

I use Facebook to get in touch with old friends and keep in touch with current friends.  I have a life on FB that spans from grade school to music camp to high school to college to musician colleagues to people I knew from past jobs and to current friends and work relations.  What is interesting about this, with the exception of my current relations, is the fact that most of the people on FB are people that already have a perception of who I am, or at least a past perception.  With all the years that have gone by, do they really know me as I am today?  I am sure they have changed as well.  So, FB remains mainly a very fun and polite way to catch up with people and share little tidbits of current life. 

Interestingly enough, I found myself getting involved in Twitter. I began using Twitter for business purposes. In some ways, Twitter is actually the better way to get to know a person, mainly due to the fact that you are starting from scratch.   I am very careful in selecting who I want to follow.  I look for quality tweeters or quality people that have something interesting to say and share.  What has been fascinating is that there is a percentage of people on Twitter that I now converse with more regularly.  Some I have met in person, spoken with on the phone or had an email conversation.  Some have hired me for business or are interested in working on joint projects.  All of these people click with me, and they know who I am as a person now.  There are no preconceptions, just knowing who I am today.  If someone asks me which social media outlet has been the most valuable to me, I would say hands down, Twitter.  It's rather refreshing meeting people without having any baggage to contend with.  It is good to see people as they are, not as who they used to be.  It was a living in the present moment, moment, when I realized this.  Very Zen.

I still find Facebook fun.  I do enjoy finding people I used to know and finding out where their lives took them and a few I am getting to know better again, but when it comes to building relationships with people, Twitter is the place where people are ready and willing to connect with who you are today.

-SDF:O)