Oh, hi there. Nice of you to drop by. Sorry I haven’t been the best host recently – I’ve been distracted by this bright, shiny thing called Twitter.

I avoided Twitter for a long time. I thought of it as a toy for narcissists and web geeks. Facebook already provides status updates – why complicate things by adding yet another social media tool.

Well, recently we decided that the festival should have a Twitter feed instead of a blog. As one of the staff required to “tweet”, I thought I should give it a try and get my own account.

It’s actually an interesting tool. For the festival, it allows us to give short updates on the festival and direct visitors to interesting information, like online articles and artist websites. Unlike Facebook, which can overwhelm you with the amount of content, Twitter is short, simple and direct.

Twitter also seems to cultivate a sense of community. Unlike Facebook, most of the people I’m following aren’t friends or family – they’re people or organizations with similar interests. There are fewer posts about people’s sick children, and more posts and links to information that I find useful.

Finally, there’s a sense that people are still finding ways to use Twitter effectively. From retweets to hashtags, it’s pretty cool to see new trends develop as the technology evolves.

If you love Facebook, great. If you’re looking for something different, give Twitter a try. Or, wait a few more weeks for the next new social media star to emerge.

FYI, you can check out the festival at www.twitter.com/bcscene. I’m at www.twitter.com/cdearlove