A lot of my friends have recently been asking me “What is the point of Twitter?… Why all the fuss?”

So here’s my answer…

If Google owns all the important information in the world, Twitter owns all of our silly little thoughts. – Daniel Priestley

Do a Google search on the G20 Summit this week and the top hits are likely to be the official web site, the Wikipedia page and a major newspaper article.

Twitter search “G20” and you get minute by minute updates from people all over the world as they comment, debate and even get arrested at the gates!

It’s live and it’s bite sized chunks of info that could only be described as “Thoughts” (although twitter calls them “tweets”).

“Thoughts” are random, they occur in little chunks and they jump from topic to topic freely.

Thanks to Twitter, we are now gladly handing over our “Thoughts” to the internet to be searched and viewed freely, forevermore.

So what is more valuable, information or thoughts?

Clearly information is more valuable and Google will remain the biggest and most valuable internet company on the web but “Thoughts” are valuable too.

Humans love finding out what people “think” of something and in that context we want it to be live, streaming and up to the minute. Twitter can deliver this.

So the value of twitter (as a business) has more to do with “search”  than it does “followers”.

What about the Value to me as a user?

If you love sharing your thoughts with people (and you may even get paid to do it) then Twitter is an excellent tool. You can build up a loyal following and keep them updated with everything from your business decisions to the news you are reading to the breakfast cereal you just ate for breakfast.