All this Twitter business

"I'm thinking that I might need some minty gum ..." – my very first "tweet" on Twitter.

I joined Twitter on April 3rd of 2007 without understanding what it was, why it was or if I'd even keep using it. At the time I wasn't much more than a random spattering of people informing anyone (who is "following") what they were doing – driving to work, stuck in traffic, eating lunch, going to bed. A one way instant message. A controlled group chat. The limit of 140 characters was daunting, enough room to say something worthwhile, but not enough to say much. Or so I thought. Some 3,942 tweets (and counting) later I think I've finally found a voice.

Twitter offers an advantage over many other forms of social media interaction in that there are wide variety of means to either colect information, reposit information, find a commnity of friends, knowledge or news. Twitter has spawned a virtual mountain of applications (the countless url shorten tools like is.gd, Bit.ly, TinyURL, et al), more robust interfaces like Twitterific, TweetDeck, DestoryTwitter, and countless other Twitter applications for anything you can think of. But even with all of this one is left wondering: What do I Twitter? Here are a few categories:

Private Users

The uses of Twitter vary greatly and it all comes down to who your audience will be. If you're a "private" account (allowing only people to "follow" you whom you want to follow you) then you will most likely be using Twitter to keep people abreast of your activites. Nothing out of the ordinary, and nothing compelling enough to share with the world (either that or you're extremely paranoid about the interwebs and what it can do, but then again, you're using Twitter, and might even buy stuff online).

Marketing Pushers

Some users see Twitter as a means to sell their product, push their website and otherwise bombard us with targets spam. While I can see the benefit of businesses using Twitter to promote a product, or better yet, offer special Twitter only promotions or coupons, the use of Twitter this way is merely another form of spam. Avoid these accounts, unless you really want information on their company or product.

Local/National News

Every newspaper should have a Twitter account. There is no better way for them to disseminate informaton, but also an amazing opportunity gather news. Users often Twitter about what they see -- take the US Airlines Flight 155 incident for instance; Twitter broke the first images, and thus the first worthwhile news.

Random Fun

Some Twitterer's just entertain us with either there humor or their interesting and fun links (this is where I hope to fall in with my Twits). You never know what you're going to get, but it won't ever be about them buying milk at Kroger, or being tired.

Information/Knowledge

There are many experts who kindly offer their knowledge, expertise, advice and insights about their field. Give it a try, search from someone you known of as an expert, most likely they Twitter (though sometimes you'll find they sign up, don't get it, and never post a status)

Celebrity

Not much to explain, if you're famous, people will follow you.You don't even have to be interesting, just the fact that you're famous means that people will want to know the imtimate details of your life.

So find your niche and Twitter away.