Twitter responsible for collapse of American economy

While this seems like a headline you would read in The Onion, I believe this is partially true. Last Wednesday, the first year CBPM class participated in the world's first class ever taught through Twitter. (This could be a vast overstatement, but I am sticking with it). We have been learning about social media in Deb Mitchell's Marketing Communications class and Twitter is one of the new, up and coming tools that marketers are using to discuss their brands.

To learn more about its abilities, Deb brought in Wisconsin's own Twitter expert, Melissa Anderson, who is the Director of PR for the Wisconsin School of Business. She asked her followers on Twitter to tune into a live chat during our class and talk about how they use Twitter both personally and professionally. As Melissa talked, we interacted with individuals from all over the country. Many were PR Directors at other schools or businesses, but some were advertising execs or brand managers, heck even a celebrity (Ashton Kutcher) piped in a few times. If you didn't know, Ashton and Demi are huge Twitterers.

Honestly, I don't remember what Melissa said as I was more interested in the Twitter conversation. I was amazed that 50 or so people were active in our conversation during the middle of the day. Most were at work. Granted, Melissa invited some to join, but that was 10 people so 40 people just happened upon our chat.

So I go back to my original statement. I think that productivity all over the country must be at an all-time low if people are trolling around Twitter looking for conversations. Are people actually working? Guess not, but hey, I learned something.

If you want to see the transcript, go to tweetchat.com and type in #bizpitch. Enjoy tweeting.