Diabetes Blog – Happy-Medium.net

I’m not a big Twitter guy.

I don’t have a smart phone. If you see a tweet from me, it means I’m on a PC or iPad somewhere, logging on and catching up with people maybe once per day. Twitter is another of those social media outlets that I have absolutely no access to from work.

I don’t have a lot of followers right now… right around 100, I think. FYI, I don’t follow people like crazy either. I think it’s my fear of being spammed to death with incessant chatter from people or companies I don’t really know. Of course, that’s what the Unfollow button is for, right? But I usually forget about that. Have you ever unfollowed someone?

Sometimes the old guy gene in my psyche makes me wonder what the stink is about, to borrow a Cheryl Crow lyric. I mean, couldn’t people just e-mail each other? Couldn’t they pick up the phone? I know, that’s so 1998.

But when I open my mind a little, I realize the benefit of Twitter, particularly for people in the Diabetes Online Community (DOC). Every day I see tweets from people I follow, offering words of encouragement and support to each other. And I have to admit to getting jazzed up by the advocacy that I see from time to time. People who are passionate about their cause (our cause), and share their passion 140 characters at a time. I’m also loving all the giveaways (giveaways!) I’m reading about.

I like the photos too, even if it’s your cat getting stuck in the Christmas tinsel again. So many of the bloggers I read seem unreal to me until I visually see something from their lives as it’s happening. Does this mean I’ve drunk the Twitteraid? Maybe so.

And I can’t talk about the DOC and Twitter without mentioning the weekly Diabetes Social Media Advocacy tweetchat. It’s hard to find a seat in that room on Wednesdays at 9:00 p.m. Eastern time here in the USA. But well worth the effort to squeeze in. For a laugh, for some provocative questions, for a new outlook on what someone else is going through. An incredible variety of people, many of whom I’m not following (and who are not following me) surprise me by their insights and their interesting views on dealing with everything diabetes. There really are a lot of different people who consider themselves part of the DOC. And DSMA does an amazing job of bringing us all together and keeping it interesting. There were a couple of times when I felt really down but I logged on anyway, and had my week turned around in the span of one hour. I’m not overstating that. It’s a small initiative that makes a big impact.

Listen… I’m at least a little tech-savvy. I realize I’m doing this in a most-unconventional way. I’m also smart enough to realize that Twitter will probably be replaced by something else in a couple of years. But for now, I’m enjoying the Twitter honeymoon, as long as it lasts.

What about you? Are you digging Twitter? Some other form of social media? Care to turn me on to the next great thing? Leave a comment below.