The Day the Conversation Stopped, Restarted

It’s remarkable how the lack of conversation at Twitter today (@ replies are down) is changing the way people look for new ways of communicating.

First read Michael Fruchter’s article on how he’s using Friendfeed rooms in an experiment to get rid of feed noise.

Here’s the lowdown:

I decided to start a room dedicated only to an individual’s Google Reader feed. The room has 38 members, or better yet editors. Thirty eight editors handpicking the best content that they deem worthy of sharing.

Let the crowds do the editing

I’m cool with that. I strongly believe in the crowd, in the strength of early adopters and of user-edited content (something I’d like to coin as opposed to user-generated content — which isn’t always what it’s made up to be).

So, obviously, I’ve joined (part) of the experiment and am going to follow the feed of this Friendfeed room.

Incidentally, with newcomer Toluu to the feed scene, there’s already been more talk about fresh starts and cleaning out feed readers. Did you know June was RSS Reset Month? Another go at letting the crowds do the job for us.

But are the crowds wise, Master?

Still, I do see some issues here. Which is why I joined in part, but haven’t started contributing yet.

Michael says one of the positives here is that these are “the feeds from some of the brightest minds & bloggers in the social media blogosphere”.

I say: are they? And if these 38 are, how  long will it last? Until we have 38,000?

And imagine if I joined: am I then bright (enough)? And what of everyone who follows me or reads my blog and decides to join?

Are you ready to contribute? Do you feel bright enough to be part of the 38?

Or the 16% for that matter?

16, 38 … It’s happening nonetheless

Oddly enough, one of the negatives according to Michael (stories with a note, get imported into the room as a comment) is something that strikes me as a plus.

It sets this feed apart from yet another aggregation feed. Instead it drives, promotes and encourages conversation. Seems like we disagree on agreeing here.

If that pans out, I may join and add to that soon enough after all.

So how’s this about Twitter and conversation?

Here’s what I read on Digital Web earlier today. It hits the nail on the head:

“Outside of the tech industry, skepticism and fear are the norm when it comes to social media. But it is simply about finding the best way to communicate with an audience. Social media consists of the same content already in use: text, audio, images, and video. The difference lies in its ability to open up new channels of communication.”

With Twitter up, down and back up, (although today, the conversation is down) I’m thinking of hanging out on my Friendfeed a lot more as well. And I’ll be embracing and talking about initiatives like Michael’s a lot more.

Join me in the converstation there.

I’m anxious to hear your views, here, on Twitter, Friendfeed, or Michael’s blog through Disqus. Don’t you love the 21st century?

Tags: aggregation, crowds, feeds, friendfeed, google, michael fruchter, rss, shared items, social media, toluu, twitter, wisdom