If you need more reasons to join Twitter, then here they are:

its like irc but with no topic and available anywhere.
its like a worldwide forum where you are the moderator of your board.
its like instant messaging but completely random.
its a cheap/free way of sending group sms to your friends.
its a wonderful distraction.
its fun.
its addictive.
its pathetic, and i should be old enough not to get involved.

i completely agree that myspace/facebook/virb/whatever suck, cos you’re locked in to those sites for your “friends”. but twitter offers much more, because it is so damn simple.

i find it hilarious that many of the people that complain about twitter will have an irc channel open all day. i’d rather get various updates from people all over the world with many different interests, than sit and watch the same few people discuss the same topics.

also, twitter can be digg done right. i get interesting links all day, but if anyone is spamming me, i just remove them.

but meh, to each his own…

Thanks to @fulltimecasual for those excellent responses. Now, onto a question that I was asking myself: What’s Twitter good for if you don’t know anyone that’s on it? None of my Calvin friends are on Twitter, so, why’d I join? Over to you, fulltimecasual:

well, i only really “know” two people on twitter, my sister and my step brother. since my step brother joined about a month ago, we’ve become much better friends, he’s a fascinating little kid. my sister randomly says things like “i dont know what the hell you are talking about, but i’m glad you happy” when i geek out too much on twitter, and that just cracks me up.

for the other 140 people i dont know but have friended, i see their updates the same way i look at mactalk. sometimes i just throw random questions out that i’m fascinated to get other peoples opinions on, like what is your fave death scene in a film? (for orange sofa haters, trust me, twitter has saved you from many boring threads) sometimes i just use it to vent, like a simple “f*** telstra”, or “f*** connex” to which i usually get a bunch of “they suck dont they? last week…” which is passes the time when connex decide to cancel yet another f**king train i’m waiting for.

i’ve also used it to get things, like my iminlikewithyou invite, which i then used to chat up an extremely hot chick from ny, who now flirts with me on twitter, which also passes the time when connex….

i’ve used it to find new podcasts, and have twittered questions to the podcasters who have then answered them on their next episode.

and if i ever get my s**t together and work on my own work, not on other peoples, then i’ll start using twitter to advertise my stuff.

having said all that though, 80% of all the updates i receive are pointless. i stick around for the 20% that arent.

(and yes, i have real friends too..)

But wait, there’s more! Thanks once again to fulltimecasual:

another use for twitter; i know a bunch of kids that run an art gallery in melbourne, one is a geek, the rest are not. the geek was sending emails all the time that the nongeeks were missing, and getting meetings orgainsed was impossible. i got the geek to set up a twitter account for him and the other board members (behind there backs of course, it would have been too annoying to explain it to them) and now when he needs to organise a meeting he tweets it, all the other board members receive the message straight away, and if one cant make it, they all know instantly.

@aulia says:

You need to be using Twitter to appreciate what it is, what it does and how it does it. Simply looking at the website would do very little to encourage you to tweet.

People don’t just use it for status updates these days, many use it as newsfeeds, notices, announcements, live reports, blog baits, etc.

And finally, something from @decryption:

Just riff on Twitter with what you’re doing – if you’re sitting at your computer reading MacTalk, tell twitter!

Join Twitter.

Add me – twitter.com/bennyling

Twitter. Do it.

Note – all responses for this post were taken from MacTalk Forums.