140Char

In amongst the turmoil of #iranelection, and the news that Twitter is starting to moderate trending topics, it’s nice to finish the week on a more humourous note.

Which is why I’m chuckling to myself about the huge number of current ReTweets:

‘Worst Daily Mail poll ever. VOTE YES to skew the results and pass it on! http://bit.ly/w4b6Q’

As of 2pm on Friday, it’s flooding the place.

And the reason for all this is the conservative right UK newspaper, The Daily Mail, whose poll of the day really does defy belief:  ‘Should the NHS allow gipsies to jump the queue?’

And the effect of Twitter probably explains why the poll is currently skewed to 85% Yes, and 15% No.

In the midst of my latest post over at TheWayoftheWeb, I started musing about whether Twitter provides a more realistic picture of me than any other mass social communication. Besides Instant Messaging, it’s the most instant, meaning less time to construct an image if you want to reply relatively quickly, and once you build up a network, there’s a definite urge to maintain relationships by Tweeting regularly – meaning far more touch points for someone to find out about me than long daily blog posts on a single topic, or the occasional message on Facebook.

We’re also seeing more results on the microblogging survey. Seems like the rise of Identi.ca as a rival to Twitter is some way off , and it’s still Plurk holding the second spot so far. It’s quite interesting that Tumblr has started off quite well – a sign I need to spend more time checking out Tumblelogs…

It’s thrown up one surprise so far – Beemood. Which is now on my list to check out and consider adding to the list!

It’s important for us to have an idea of what microblogging tools are most used by our readers. And so: