Kirk Mahoney . com

I wrote on October 17, 2008, that I was going to create a forum for you, the readers of KirkMahoney.com, as one way to give me feedback.

I actually set up a forum based on Vanilla.

But I never launched the forum here because of these key reasons:

1. Although Vanilla is excellent, it is yet another Web application to maintain.
2. Forums require moderation, which also requires time that I do not have.
3. Some forum posters write dissertations, but I want to keep posts short — to encourage reading and interaction.

Twitter as a Forum

Twitter to the rescue!

1. Twitter’s team maintains Twitter.
2. Twitter’s moderators will bounce people who offend.
3. Twitter keeps all “tweets” to 140 characters or fewer.

So I decided to use Twitter as the forum for KirkMahoney.com.

• If I want to draw attention to a special post, then I use Twitter.
• If you want to comment on one of my posts, then you use Twitter.
• If you want to comment on someone’s comment, then you use Twitter.

Even better,

• You can use Twitter to ask a question.
• I am more likely to respond to a tweet than to an email message.
• Twitter is a great place to ask me to cover something in my blog.
• You can tweet links for everyone — and without clogging my inbox!
• I can sometimes respond to you in real time.

That is all there is to it! Simple. Fast. Social.

How to Use Twitter as Our Forum

To use Twitter as the forum for KirkMahoney.com, we need each other’s help.

1. I need your Twitter identity, so that I can follow you.
2. You need my Twitter identity, so that you can follow me.
3. I also need your name and email address, so that you can get private communications from me — and me alone.

Please let me explain each of these:

1. I get lots of followers on Twitter who have not seen my blog. I am not following many of those followers (again, because of limited time). But I want to follow you on Twitter because you are following me there because of my blog.
2. Some of my “Better Communications for Smart People” tweets are not about my blog posts, so you have to follow me on Twitter to get those tweets.
3. By giving me your name and email address, I can email you, my blog readers, directly about Twitter tips and other topics. Those messages require more than 140 characters, so tweets are too small, and I want to focus our tweets on non-Twitter topics. And Twitter’s Direct Message (”DM”) technology does not let me write simultaneously to more than one person at a time.

Now Do This

So get a Twitter identity (Tip: Capitalization of your “Username” during sign-up shows up later!), then give me your name, email address, and Twitter ID here:

Once you click the button, please look for a confirmation email message and click the link inside to connect to me on Twitter.

Thanks! I look forward to exchanging tweets with you!