I’ve tried twitter on numerous occasions. I just can’t make it a habit. Yet I keep hearing about how valuable many people find it for staying in touch with friends, family, and colleagues. Why are these micro-communication tools so popular? Possibly because they are phatic communication tools?: “This is communication with little hard, informational content, but lots of emotional and social content. Phatic communications doesn’t get much said, but it has social effects so powerful, it gets lots done.”
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The phatic level is certainly there.
But the term “microblogging” applies, and suggests other layers of use. I certainly obtain and share informational content through Twitter, as per the blog model.