Microblogs

=MICROBLOGS=



Technical Description
Microblogs can be considered a subset of blogs. They have a similar idea- post topics of interest to the person. However, there a quite a few differences between blogs and microblogs. For starts, the "post" is usually very, very short. Twitter, for example, only allows 140 total characters to be used for each post. Another difference is that there usually isn't any surrounding pages around a microblog. The stream is usually the only real content. Finally, most microblogs are more about person, and less about a topic, though that line can blend.

Microblogs usually operate with a stream of posts. The user follows other users, and in that stream, sees their posts, and their replies to other posts. Since microblogs have short posts, it makes replies easy, and a conversation can develop between users. Microblogs are very similar to chat programs (such as AIM), but they save the content, and its not necessarily real time.



Educational Usage
The uses for microblogs can be quite limited. There are few ones that allow complete control by school districts. For example with blogs, districts can have their own installation of Wordpress, but there is not much out there like for microblogs. Probably the only good usage of microblogs is for teachers to post updates about their classroom, where parents can follow and respond back.