My Twitter Story by @melissaar

Over the year, I have met other people and gone to other tweetups. It’s a friendly and entertaining group who are there for you when you are up and are praying for you when you are down. They managed to save the dean of UALR Law School’s life. (well sorta) I’ve had the opportunity to meet people that I wouldn’t have met under any other circumstances and to share ideas with people whom I probably wouldn’t have had time if I had to do it one on one. It also reminds me that I am not alone and the world is bigger than the town I am in.

Read her full post at runmelissarun.wordpress.com

I have a #LRTweetup story, and I’ve never attended a Tweetup by @erniebufflo

I still can’t get over the fact that a group of people I’ve never “met” nominated me for an award, though I guess it’s a testament to my tendency to insert my loudmouthed self into the center of things, but more than that, a testament to this group’s welcoming attitude.  I can’t wait to meet each and every member of the #LRTweetup community.

Read her full post at erniebufflo.wordpress.com

How Twitter Saved My Life (kinda) by @jmdipippa

Twitter allowed  me to break out of the isolation my recuperation imposed. I don’t like to be cooped up and rarely sit still at work but moving was challenging and uncomfortable. Twitter gave me incentive to work on my recovery.  I tweeted the number of steps I had taken that day or my recovering appetite or my new Guitar Hero scores.  And the encouragement from my new twitter buddies kept me accountable to them and gave me even more incentive to take a few more steps the next day.  It kept me happy and helped me to become healthy.

Read his full post at ualr.edu/jmdipippa

Untitled by @plecroybrown

While only a little bit of information can be conveyed in 140 characters, a relationship with another person can be formed via multiple posts or direct messages over time. Forming relationships is the true power of Twitter and I feel that is where this platform will excel in the upcoming years. Like-minded people will gravitate  toward each other to form new partnerships or friendships and thus create new ideas, perpetuating the underlying creativity behind Twitter.

Read her full post at plecroybrown.wordpress.com

But What’s Your Real Name? by @laureneclark

I love to meet the real people with real lives and real names behind the nicknames we recognize from our minute-to-minute glances at our screens. We’ve all found ourselves in the middle of introductions referring to each other as @______. But nothing beats seeing each other IRL…and nurturing those virtually founded friendships. So don’t be surprised if, after the great things you and I may have shared on this Twitter-thingy, I smile and ask “But what’s your real name?” when we do finally meet. Because behind every good Twitter name…there’s a real person, #fine and #fabulous!

Read her full post at burstofquestioningwind.tumblr.com

ACT I: The Bald Man and the Challenge

I was introduced to Twitter by a preternaturally energetic bald man named @adambroitman. At the time he was Director of Emerging and Creative Strategy for Morpheus Media, before moving on to Director of Strategy at Crayon. He’s now Partner and Ringleader at Circ.us.

As a friend of @MaryroseWagoner, Adam was speaking at a PRSA luncheon on social media a few years ago, and he was incredibly nice, genuine and excited about the future of this medium. At the end of his talk, he encouraged the entire room of public relations professionals to create Twitter accounts. He challenged us, in fact, as communicators, to put Little Rock on the Twitter map.

So, I went right back to my office that same day and did exactly that. I opened a Twitter account, I mean. The rest wouldn’t come until much later, and as it would turn out, people I hadn’t even met would be responsible for meeting that challenge.

See, up to this point in my life, I was happy to remain relatively anonymous. I had a small circle of friends, many professional colleagues and an unlisted phone number. You could say I was more guarded than an iPhone prototype on a Saturday night, but that would just be mean. Putting myself out there, online, for Google to index and for all the world to see really made me nervous.

What if I said something stupid? I would most assuredly say something stupid. Whoever penned the words “Tis better to remain silent and be thought a fool than to open your mouth and remove all doubt” had never signed up for a Twitter account, I was sure of it.

But I wasn’t about to back down from Adam’s challenge.

So I took the plunge. I followed @adambroitman and a bunch of other people, including @chrisbrogan and @cc_chapman and @steverubel. I followed people all across the country, like @Scobleizer and @jowyang and @charleneli. I followed @TechCrunch and @SocialMediaClub and @Mashable. And I listened and learned from these folks and many, many others as I tried to understand this new form of communicating and connecting.

ACT II: Kind of like Magic: The Gathering, Except with Less Black

Fast forward a year and hundreds of (probably stupid) tweets later, and I still knew only a handful of local people on Twitter. Then something happened, some critical mass of adoption, participation and planetary alignment, and when someone said “Tweetup” out loud one day, the local Twitter scene blew up right before my eyes.

I watched as @LT created a hashtag, #LRTweetup was born and people came from all corners, excited to meet other local people on Twitter. Natalie ran to fetch nametags. We peeled them with glee and wrote our usernames in Sharpie marker, tittering at the complete silliness of it all, and we descended upon Sticky Fingerz like a parliament of geeky rooks. It was, in a word, awesome.

While Natalie and I may have started this hot mess, it was people like @tsudo and @alextcone and @bryanjones and @jgreghenderson who jumped in and organized us, blogged us, scheduled us and pushed us toward our first official charity event, Twestival. It was people like @amybhole who offered us @capitalbargrill and special blue drinks. Then it was all the rest of you, who came out despite your fears of what you might find.

And let me tell you, I am so glad you did.

ACT III: Only Fools Fall in Love with Hashtags

Watching this community grow has been one of the most amazing experiences of my life.

I’ve learned that #printlives. I’ve learned to #passonthegift and #taketimetogive and #reachoutandread. And I’ve learned to follow #ARwx at the first sign of bad weather, a hashtag deserving of its own theme music and tagline: “Come with me if you want to live.” Say it with the accent. It’s fun.

You all amaze me with your talents. I learn something from each of you on a daily basis. Your funny, endearing, ever so smart and generous words encourage me to keep writing, after suffering a case of burnout so severe I had to change careers. I watch you take care of each other and support each other. And you continually inspire me to be smarter, nicer and braver today than I was yesterday.

Really, what more can you ask from a group of total strangers you met on the Internet? We’re incredibly lucky to have been here in this moment, to see this unfold in precisely this way. It speaks to the immense power of this medium we share, and to our limitless potential as human beings to accomplish so much more together than we ever could alone.

I’ve learned from all of you to keep opening my mouth, stupid or not. And if that makes me a fool, or a geek, or a nerd, then I’m certainly among some of the best company I’ve ever known.

#thankyou #lrtweetup

These Are My People by @kerrijack

Last year, two friends I know professionally in town Natalie and Angel started joking around on Twitter that each were getting close to (I think it was) 400 followers. A bet was made that whoever got to 400 first got a drink from the other. My friend Stacey and I both perked up like Scooby Doo, “Drinks? Social? Fun?” Things took off from there. Let’s invite EVERYONE! So the call went out: We’re having a TweetUp! Anyone in Little Rock on Twitter, let’s meet up at Sticky Fingerz. We’ll be nerds. Won’t that be fun?!

Read her full post at damnyoulittlerock.wordpress.com

On Little Rock Tweetups by @mattbarnette

… I realize what kind of people are out there, and I, more than anyone (and this will seem strange coming from me, probably) am in love with the world. I am constantly amazed, dumbfounded, and learning about the world I live in and the people who inhabit it. Sure, when life on our planet is gone it will barely be a blip on the galaxy’s radar, but I am part of that larger community and it is beautiful and I am proud to have been a tiny speck of dust in it.

Read his full post at mattbarnette.com

Are You The Answer to My Mid-Life Crisis? by @pstrack

This is a community that has encouraged me to Take Time To Give. A community that has taught me that you won’t find a Gowalla at the Zoo, but you might find Monkey Boy there. A community that has shown me the power of 140 characters. A community that may despise presentations, but loves the Prezi. A community that has convinced me that Print Lives. A community that stays up all night, and is still able to  contribute incredibly during the day.  A community that not-so-gracefully informed us all that ice cream isn’t just a treat for kids!

Read his full post at pstrack.wordpress.com

I Didn’t Win an iPod. I Won a New Community by @alextcone

… it wasn’t until I went to an integrating media conference that I knew I would never turn back. @pstrack gave away several iPod Nanos. I didn’t win one, but after that day I won a new community. I met @amybhole, @cherylferg, @KatieMcManners, @RobMcBryde, @kerrijack and so many other exceptional personalities. #LRTweetup finally made sense. There would be no more holding back. My wife would permanently think me a dork, but I would forever be a card carrying member of the Little Rock twitter community: #LRTweetup

Read his full post at alextcone.tumblr.com