Re: Using twitter as an outage notification

[Roland Perry <lists () internetpolicyagency com>]

In article <4A4FD58B.2000703 () gmail com>, JC Dill 
<jcdill.lists () gmail com> writes
> Even easier, you make an email address on your system that is an alias 
> to posterous.   So they send to "post () schoolsystem edu" which .forwards 
> out to posterous, which posts to the school blog, myspace, facebook, 
> twitter,

It doesn't have any of those, that's the point really.

Is twitter the one I should get them started with first?

> Show them how a radio station can retweet the info

It's have to be automated as there are hundreds to do over a periods of 
a few tens of minutes (the schools don't generally announce they are 
closing until they see how many teachers made it to work, and that's not 
long before they have to open - students get marked down for being late, 
even in bad weather, so can't delay setting out from home; it's an 
interesting operational model.)

> and then announce "to get info on school closings, follow us on twitter 
> at...."

http://twitter.com/trentfmnews (but it's not exactly high traffic)

> and everyone can send the info TO the radio station and get the info 
> FROM the radio station quickly and easily.

The radio station would probably be overwhelmed if they got much more 
than one tweet per school.

> > I don't think it has. All they ever hear about other Web2.0 like 
> > Facebook and Bebo is how dangerous they are for kids.
>
> Sheesh.  Cars and bikes are far more dangerous for kids than Facebook 
> and Bebo.  That's why kids are taught the rules of the road, to always 
> wear bike helmets, to always buckle up in the car, and they get driver 
> training.

Part of my day job is getting that sort of training about using the 
Internet, into schools. So far most of them have only got as far as 
teaching the students how to operate Powerpoint (yes I know that's not 
an Internet application), and installing filters to try to keep them off 
YouTube during lessons.

> > But I'm beginning to think that finally maybe Twitter has the right 
> > profile for this application.
>
> Again, why limit yourself?  Use all the tools available.

One step at a time :)
--
Roland Perry