Posted at 19:50 30 April 2009 by James Barbour | Comments[1]
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James Barbour
Russian Federation
Thursday 30 April, 2009
Nice name-check for this blog, and a number of other FCO blogs in this part of the world, on Andy Young's www.siberianlight.net the other day. I hadn't come across Siberian Light before, but if you're looking for broad and objective blog coverage of this part of the world it's a pretty good place to start.
As Andy notes, posts on this blog have been a little thin on the ground of late, for which I apologise. I've perhaps been more visible elsewhere of late, thanks to the small storm in the RuNet's teacup over on LiveJournal this week surrounding a certain Moscow social columnist's visa application. All is now happily resoved, so I shall refocus my efforts on this blog.
For those of you interested in Twitter, or more broadly in the development of social media in Russia and the immediate neighbourhood (and, let's face it, who isn't after recent events in Moldova?), Andy's post on Twitter in Russia is a must-read.
I 'tweet' on occasion, sometimes for business and sometimes for pleasure. An example: When Lord Malloch-Brown visited Moscow recently, we live-Twittered pictures of him giving a radio interview on the London Summit - because we could. It's not a substiute for blogging, but Twitter's mobility and immediacy gives it a very different niche.
Thanks to Twinkle's location support I've noticed a marked increase in Twitter traffic (sorry, I can't bring myself to say 'tweet' too often) in and around Moscow. And, where Moscow leads, the rest of the country will (perhaps) follow. Much of it's still geek-speak, but there's a healthy spread of political chatter in there too. Take a look, starting with some of the twitterers Andy recomments - you'll be pleasantly surprised.
I'll end with a question: How many of you use Twitter? And, if you do, what sort of Tweets are you looking for from people like me?