Conor's Bandon Blog

I know the whole Twitter thing is still completely alien to a lot of people. How many wondered what the hell the papers were on about when discussing Dan Boyle’s “tweet“?

Here’s a suggestion for dipping your toe in and getting a handle on it all. Karwig Wines in Carrigaline is running the third “Twebt” which is a Twitter wine-tasting competition (Bubble Brothers and Curious Wines ran the first two).

The idea is very simple. You get a bottle of wine from Joe and his gang in Karwig’s and it is wrapped up so you can’t see the label. At an agreed time, 9pm Sunday March 7th, people open the wine and start tasting it and putting their tasting notes up on Twitter.Then they start guessing the country, grape etc and maybe even the exact wine.

It’s a bit of fun and those taking part range from gurus to tipplers and everyone in between.

Full details on taking part are on Brian Clayton’s Blog and on the Karwig’s Blog. If you just want to watch what happens then you can see all the tweets in the run-up and on the night over at http://search.twitter.com/search?q=%23twebt.

If you had never heard of Twitter before, the relentless coverage of it on RTE and elsewhere recently must surely have changed that. It’s a simple system for messaging people who follow you but in a completely public way. You can pick whose messages you see by default too. Here’s a quick snapshot of those I follow:

One of the nice aspects of Twitter is that it leads to real-world interactions too. There are regular meet-ups called Tweetups where people can have a few drinks, maybe a bite to eat and have a bit of proper social interaction.

Ann Donnelly is organising West Cork’s first ever Tweetup in Clonakilty this Friday. It’s on in the Courtyard Bar in Clon from 8pm. If you are on Twitter or want to find out more about it or just want to meet with some friendly people then why not head on over? All details are on the blog.

Here are some of the West Cork (I’m including up to Ballincollig and Macroom in West) Twits that I know about: Ann, Mike Kane, Matt Kane, Anthony Creswell, Catherine, Simon Whelband, Calvin Jones, Walter Higgins, Me, Randy, Margaret Jordan, Gordon Murray. If I’ve missed you, leave a comment with a link to your profile!

I’ve mentioned Twitter many times on this blog. Bit by bit, it is going mainstream. It’s a great way to hang out online (or on your phone via SMS or mobile web) with people you like and who can fit their thoughts into 140 chars.

But Twitter has a ton of practical uses too, one of which is saving money. My buddies in Nooked have created a ryanair_ork account there which publishes some great special offers regularly on Ryanair flights from Cork.

Signing up on Twitter only takes a moment, then just “follow” ryanair_ork and enjoy the savings.