What are you doing?

"What are you doing?"

No time for long, drawn-out responses, just give it to me in 140 characters or less.

Twitter is awesome. It's such a simple idea that you might be saying (as I first did), "What the heck? This is silly." But it's actually really revolutionary in its simplicity.

So, how does it work? Well, you sign up for an account (which is free). Then, you have to start posting what you're up to in 140 characters or less. You can post using the website or using IM or using SMS. You can post a different way each time. But, the fun part comes when your friends sign up and you can follow each other's posts and make snide remarks back and forth.

There are two instances where I think Twitter is particularly brilliant:

In crisis situations. The example Phil likes to use is when the Minneapolis bridge collapsed, his sister Amy (who lives in Minneapolis) could have quickly Twittered, "I'm okay!" and we would have all been notified immediately. Instead, we each had to call her or text her and she had to respond to us separately letting us know she was okay. Since Twitter pushes out updates from people you've chosen to follow, it's great for sending an update to a lot of people all at once -- and it's received by them however they'd like to receive it (you can also receive updates on your phone or via IM).

To tune into day-to-day stuff about my friends. When I'm talking to my friends and family, I would rarely mention to them about the funny bumper sticker I saw on the way to work, or that I got my hair cut. But, I would post things like that on Twitter. So, if you're subscribed to your friends' posts on Twitter, you get a good picture of what their daily lives are like. I could see how that could be scary, but, so far, I've found it to be really fun.

Check it out, set up an account and invite your friends to do it, too. You can follow whomever you like; you can even make others get permission to follow you, if you want. The more, the merrier!