Social Media Without The Internet

This week has been a real eye opener for me.

Twitter As Social Media

Since May last year I have been twittering away on twitter [@andrewburnett ]. All the while I’ve been following others who entertain, interest and often educate me.


It has all felt very very social. But until this week I didn’t realise I was missing out on possibly the single greatest benefit of twitter: Meeting fellow twitts

Social Media In Real Life

This week I took the plunge and headed along to RefreshEdinburgh on Wednesday evening where I met (in no particular order):
@nonimage [Andy Lobban]
@sneeu [John Sutherland]
@roryf [Rory Fitzpatrick]
@nelstrom [Andrew Neil]
@EdinburghMenus [he who hath no card getteth his real name forgotten ;)].

Thursday evening my good lady wife accompanied me to a talk on social media (of all things) by Mike Coulter for the Edinburgh Internet Marketing Meetup Group . First and foremost it was a great talk with many insights, but it also brought many twitts together in one room. I met (again in no particular order):
@jimwolffman
@dav_hamill
@colingilchrist
and of course @mikecoulter.

If I’d managed to go to the pub afterwards no doubt I’d have collected even more @s! Mike plugged the Edinburgh Coffee Morning meet up which is every Friday morning – you’ve guessed it, I went.

This morning (Friday) I met (along with others from last night)
@jonmountjoy
@darciec
[edit]I didn’t get your twitter handles at the time, but found you since:
@hazelh
@nevstokes
[/edit]

So What?

As much as you can squeeze into 140 characters nothing beats meeting people face to face, talking over a coffee and exchanging knowledge and ideas. That’s what!