Some of the voices I most respect in the blogosphere have started to use Twitter recently. Some for quite some time now. Some of the voices I most respect in the blogosphere have not, and I'd be surprised if they ever did.

So I'm debating the issue. Here are the 5 pros and cons I've come up with so far.


5 Reasons I Don't Twitter (Twit?, Tweet?)

1. My God! Who has the time!! I don't know about you, but blogging already takes up a nice, big slice of my time, and the question of whether it's worth is always something I'm re-assessing. The whole Twitter thing just seems over-the-top, unless you're online for a living, which I'm not.

2. I'd rather not collude with a sound-bite world. Relay your thoughts in 140 characters or less? I mean, how low are we gonna go? Condensing thoughts into digestible pieces is often necessary, but I'm a huge proponent of pointing out the dangers of taking that concept too far. Twitter doesn't seem to help that cause.

3. Absence makes the heart grow fonder. I love my friends. But if I had to be around them continuously, I'd probably start wanting to pull out their fingernails. You see what I'm getting at?

4. Do I really need more thoughts out there? The last thought that passes through my mind before I press "Publish" is "Am I comfortable with this thought/idea being 'out there?'" Usually the answer is "yes," but there's been more than a few occasions where I've concluded "no," and the post never made it to light. And there are a few other occasions where I've second-guessed my "yes." The point is, these are real decisions for an attorney, a father, a husband, an active church member, and a guy looking to get a first book published. It's tough to go through 3-4 times a week. I don't think I'd want to go through it 3-4 times a day.

5. As a (stumbling) disciple of Jesus Christ, I'd be pretty hesitant to ask people to "Follow Me."



5 Reasons I Should

1. Dialogue. Blogging leads to dialogue...in a sense. But it's not real dialogue. Real dialogue looks a lot more like a quick succession of 140-character thoughts bouncing back and forth than it does a one-page proposition followed by random comments. Dialogue is good.

2. More self-reflection. If I had to publicly answer the question "What are you doing?" more often, it might very well make me try harder to be doing something worthy of an answer.

3. Succinct thoughts lead to better writing. As the flip-side to Pro-reason #2, I really think that the more succinct your writing, the better your writing. Although I'm not often accused of running off at the keyboard (actually, I'm more often accused of the opposite), the 140-character limit might be a good mental exercise.

4. If Andrew Jones, Brother Maynard, and Dan Kimball are doing it, it can't be all bad.

5. 1 Cor. 9:20-22.


Help me out here. Are you on Twitter? Why or why not?

Grace and Peace,
Raffi