Common-Nature

You might be surprised to learn that the guru of getting things done, David Allen, uses twitter. However, of the various social media out there, it sounds as if Twitter is the one tool David might use the most, according to this recent podcast.

The main take away points of the podcast? That you should view Twitter as going to a cocktail party. Ask yourself why you’re going. If it’s to keep yourself networked and out there, going to a party (or using Twitter) might be one of the easiest ways to do so.

Twitter is now getting enough traction that people are finding some pretty good uses for it.

One contender is to run an informal straw poll.

One site that can help you do this is strawpollnow.com.

The system interfaces with the Twitter api so that you an create a poll and send folks to that poll via Twitter. The poll not only keeps track of the breakdown of your poll but also provides for comments as each person responds.

Here is a sample poll I built in less than a minute.

Govtech.com has a great article on Portland Oregon’s use of Twitter.
Portland is the first U.S. city to launch an official “Twisitor Center.” This Twitter channel connects travelers with those who can answer their questions and help plan their trips.

Yet another example of how government is using Twitter.

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