I have read countless posts about how foolish it was that Oprah gave Ashton Kutcher the title of King of Twitter. The most recent post that I read was on searchenginewatch.com where the author was thoroughly upset. While I agree with some of what I’ve read I think that many of the posts that I have read really miss the important aspects of what is happening.
- Twitter has officially Crossed the Chasm . I might be exaggerating slightly, but once Oprah defines something as worthy of her time, people jump on board.
- Ashton is King? Maybe of his household, but not of Twitter. However, does it really matter who is crowned King? It doesn’t matter if it’s Kutcher, Chris Brogan, Guy Kawasaki, or even me. Who cares? What matters is that people are talking about the platform.
While I agree that the race to 1 million followers is foolish, it has done a good job of raising awareness of twitter and of social media in a very large way.
Yes, others have paved the way for the current crop of celebrities. You can’t knock, however, the impact that this stunt might have. Short-term you will see a large influx of new users coming to the platform. This new awareness could enable the platform to begin to reach it’s potential as a social media marketing platform, the one thing that I feel gives Twitter a chance of becoming a profitable business.
What do you think? Will it further the cause of social media?
John
John on Twitter
April 18, 2009 at 3:20 pm
John,
totally agree with you. even though there is a lot of hoopla around the whole Ashton thing, and Oprah has jumped on board, I think Twitter has come out ahead and that means that everyone benefits.
Maybe it will give us even greater access to those we want or neet to connect with. I only hope it is a huge benefit to Twitter so it will remain the free network we have all come to know love and hang out on.
Heidi Richards Mooney