Blog about Twitter

The only similarity I see between a Twitter discussion and a Blackboard discussion is the ability to retweet or respond to the original post maker, while an in-class discussion is closer to Blackboard than it is to Twitter. 

The biggest difference I see comparing Twitter to a Blackboard discussion is inclusivity. Twitter is open for everyone to see, whereas Blackboard discussions only allow the people registered in the class to see and comment. While the professor may be the moderator of Blackboard, everyone is in charge of their own Twitter tweets. This also puts pressure on everyone on Twitter using Twitter because now your content and opinions are available for a much larger crowd to see and form their opinions on.

Additionally, Twitter has a character limit while Blackboard doesn’t. Twitter forces you to make your thoughts concise before tweeting while on Blackboard, with no word limit, you can write as much as you choose. Blackboard is organized by time and you can easily see everyone’s posts, however on Twitter, tweets show up according to how much publicity it has already received. If it shows up on my home screen, it will probably be of interest to me. You can also use hashtags on Twitter to include yourself on certain comments while on Blackboard you can only respond. There is no way to group posts together besides by original post maker and those who replied. 

An in-class discussion however doesn’t provide a trail of what is said, unless it is being recorded. Similar to Blackboard posts, it is limited to those in the room, or in the class, and the professor would most likely be the moderator. Unlike the others, in an in-class discussion, it doesn’t allow people to think about the discussion after the class time is over and add their thoughts like they can on online sites. Due to this, especially if it’s a long discussion topic that we want to continue, it would be preferred to start a twitter hashtag or a Blackboard discussion post since we can always continue to add our thoughts, at least for a week, and maintain a record of what people have thought and responded before us.