Loudmouthman

Twittering has to be a symptom of a dysfunctional society.

Posted on 05. May, 2009 by nik in Personal, blog

Well that is the view of  Nadine Dorries – MP for Mid-Bedfordshire whose current blog post on her lack of interest on joining twitter leaves me yet again shaking my head that people  who blog can do so in such an incredible information vacum.

Lets address some of the more interesting points ?

Did I really want to know what three hundred followers made of the film ‘In The Loop’. One opinion would do.

Well yes one comment might do, providing its the right one, however a sample set of several hundred comments which give you a more rounded and informed view of an opinion is a good thing. Having good , relevant and up to date   information is very, very, important and I would hope all our MPs would consider this the case.

Twittering has to be a symptom of a dysfunctional society. You know the one I’m talking about; when people don’t talk to, care about, help, consider or even interact with each other anymore. A survey last week found that the average Briton has three good friends.

Could it be a symptom of people finding ways to reach out beyond their own physical locations and finding new ways to  make  friends via a  wider space. I know that I would hope my experiences and life views would be beyond the village walls?  As for for three good friends ? Are we playing a numbers game with whom can have the most best friends ? Surely it is better for a person to have ANY friend they can call good than to play a numbers game of good and close vs far and virtual ?

Three good friends will be down to one in ten years as a whole generation of children who should have been kicking a ball around and building dens, take to the streets and discover that they don’t know how to cope, lacking the ability to share or socially interact. Largely due to spending their childhood on an X box or a lap top. Maybe twitter is where they will turn to for comfort.

There is plenty of other reports and surveys  to demonstrate that online network building and gameplay only serve to encourage, promote and improve social skills. Especially for those for whom kicking a football around is not the preffered activity of choice. The question I would ask is , what was the survey really trying to prove ?

Might I suggest that for as much as there are things you may not wish to Twitter there are so many more things you certainly shouldnt blog.

You may however be interested in reading these  articles to gain a more informed position on where Twitter and Social Networks are as a tool in modern society, politics and people.

The Conservatives own Web Page , which has a link for twitter on its main page. Or  an article I wrote on the topic  An Article on how I have used twitter to discuss Parish Council experiences.

Further I  should thank  Helen Duffett and Christian Payne both twitter members whose  own twitterings had brought your article to my attention

Perhaps you would like to come with me to a Tuttle Club meeting at the Institute of Contemporary Arts and meet and talk to the many great , creative and smart people . People whom I know are already hard at work using Twitter, Blogs, Video blogs as well as  actual face to face meetings.

I leave that response entirely to you.

Thanks for Reading.

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So.ME Congratulations are in order.

Posted on 05. Oct, 2008 by nik in Personal, blog

If I seem a little non-posting lately it will be because of the arrival of our new child, Harry Butler born on the 5th of Sept 2008 and between then and now I have naturally been a little busy.

One of the things I did wish to do was post an acknowledgment for every message I received from all my twitter followers. This turned out to be an interesting exercise in search tools, php and twitter api.

For the most part the Search feature of twitter provided me a list of users whom had congratulated me.

Those pages  when saved to my hard drive needed to be manipulated using grep and awk to extract all the twitter status IDs part of the process was for me to sort the IDs and to remove any duplicates I may have created. From there I wrote a second program in php which read those numbers and reposted the congratulation  messages in a new page with the included styles so that I could in turn post the results into this post ( phew! ) okay here are the results.

Here are the names of everyone whom sent their best regards and comments on the occassion. Thank you one and all.

LittleLaura @loudmouthman awww – just retuned into twitter to see if any news… and there it is… congrats to you all!

12seconds @loudmouthman congratulations on your baby! yay! We’re very happy for you!

cliveflint @loudmouthman well done to mrs butler. Congrats!

mayjah @loudmouthman Congrats! Babies are fun!

Bsimi @loudmouthman Congrats to you and your family on the birth of your son !!!

Corum @loudmouthman Congrats Nik!

foodphilosophy @loudmouthman Congrats!!!

freecloud @loudmouthman congrats . This, as they say, is where it gets interesting !

peeebeee @loudmouthman Whoo-hoo! Congrats all round.

rojopelo @loudmouthman Congrats on birth young Harry. Little people are always loud.

danleach @loudmouthman Big Congrats LMM

tmofee @loudmouthman congrats dude! just saw the post on FB….

JoeCascio @loudmouthman Congrats on your new arrival!

Alheri @loudmouthman congrats to the family and welcome to the world Harry!

Documentally @loudmouthman Nice one a boy!! perfect Well done you guys!

PurpleCar @loudmouthman! I hear you have a Harry in your house? Beware! Those things usually attract others! Congrats!

AngryAfrican @loudmouthman Congratulations! And a huge African welcome to baby Harry Butler. Welcome big fella!

vero @loudmouthman congrats! Glad everyone is well and hope the drive in wasn’t too bad xox

ophelia @loudmouthman new baby!! time for pancakes!! congratulations. :O)

3stairs @loudmouthman congrats to all – welcome Harry!

Alheri @loudmouthman Bonny baby with lots of hair! Once again best to parents, baby and sibling. He is starting early in cyberspace.

mrsb @loudmouthman http://twitpic.com/adfu – Congrats to Dad, Mom and Big Sister! He’s beautiful

Documentally @loudmouthman http://twitpic.com/adfu – Fantastic! Well done!

mayjah @loudmouthman http://twitpic.com/adfu – Oh fresh baby head smell! He is in that quiet phase, you know, before they go ballistic.

KitiaraTomsen @loudmouthman WOOHOO! Congrats to all!

anniemole @loudmouthman http://twitpic.com/adfu – Congrats he looks very cute!

Pishba @loudmouthman the baby is just gorgeous. You must be so happy and exhausted. http://twitpic.com/adfu

Danacea @loudmouthman http://twitpic.com/adfu – Good Morning, little Harry Butler – lovely to see you. Congrats to all xx

artbizness @loudmouthman http://twitpic.com/adfu Hey, he’s VERY cute! And all that hair! Congrats again.

Akelaa @loudmouthman Hey man, congrats on the loudmouthbaby!

GeekMommy @loudmouthman http://twitpic.com/adfu – Absolutely gorgeous!! Congrats to the whole Butler clan on the newest member!

paulnicholls @loudmouthman great news Nick, well done mate

fred2baro @loudmouthman congrats for the new member in family cheers to the mom

Tricon @loudmouthman Congrats, man. That’s so exciting.

DFBMBE @loudmouthman all the very best congrats from Kosovo! For Harry and King George!

Bundini @loudmouthman Hip, hip, hurray for Harry! Congrats! Great picture too!

ewanspence @loudmouthman Congrats

ThomAllen @loudmouthman have one on me there brother! Oh, and congrats too.

paulswansen @loudmouthman Great picture. Congrats.

Gokelly @loudmouthman your little one cute congrats

Shelleyftr @loudmouthman Hi Daddy! How are you and yours doing? Well done! Sorry, what was this statment in reponse to. Confused.com (not hard,blonde)

jeffpulver @loudmouthman Good morning and Congrats!

Merlene @loudmouthman Congrats! He’s beautiful. You must all be so very proud. Well done

cliveflint @loudmouthman Well done, Good to hear they are coming home. Now it’s sleepless nights.

alexbellinger @loudmouthman tiwtionary’s a cool idea Belated congrats on the little loudmouth.

CASizemore @loudmouthman re: recycling point for unused baby names. Its called fiction, you now have a bunch of character names.

cbensen @loudmouthman http://twitpic.com/adfu – He is SO sweet! Congrats Nik & family!

jamesbody @loudmouthman Just saw your tweet about baby feeding – had not realized that it has all happened – Congrats!

orchid8 @loudmouthman just take a good long whiff of baby Harry’s head. there is nothing like that in the whole world.

Shelleyftr @loudmouthman Stop with the baby clips LOL!! (my clock is so ticking LOL!)

hamzaw @loudmouthman you’ve got a new baby too? Congratulations! We just had a girl sprog 4 weeks ago. Great fun!

SuzyMiller @loudmouthman How’s baby and mummy?

3stairs @loudmouthman congrats – sleep in any increasing increment is reason to celebrate! here we get the Early Morning Pleading for Pooh

3stairs @loudmouthman lol! ah, the lovely days of a dozen nappies…SO glad i’m not there right now! drunk baby look is absolutely adorable, though

ianshepherd @loudmouthman I forgive you for being so cheerful, you’ve just had a new baby and haven’t realised what hard work it is yet

TristaTwesten @loudmouthman: Well congrats. Send me some.

ijeanes @loudmouthman… congrats… Is Harry the newbie?

I think that just about covers it all. Thank you everyone who posted a there regards. Now normal service may be resumed shortly.

Thank you for your congratulations and thank you for reading.

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