This post will show you the first Tweets of some of today’s tech and work “futurists”, and how to discover the first tweets from anyone or about anything.
Manhattan, mid November 2014, hacking the future of work. The “secret” (ish) meeting spot is an uber-cool loft-style event space – with brightly colored chairs, sure to encourage creativity. Around me are some of the planet’s top thinkers and writers from the worlds of digital and social media marketing, employment trends, and workplace strategy.
We (see how I lumped myself in there) were gathered by IBM and their content marketing partner, Purematter, to hack the future of work, and to witness the unveiling of IBM’s new inbox dashboard, VERSE. This is not your father’s Lotus Notes. And these are not your typical bloggers, authors and thought leaders.
These are the IBM Social Business Futurists.
I thought it would be fun to look at the first tweets of the futurists recruited by IBM and Purematter for the first ever #Thinkathon.
Cool Tools used for this exercise:
- To find any Twitter user’s first Tweet, just go to https://discover.twitter.com/first-tweet.
- I also found a cool tool to discover the first tweet about any word or term. Check out this cool app by prolific tool builder @labnol.
The first tweet with #newwaytowork
At the @elance tweetup at varnish! Cool venue! #newwaytowork #didnotwintheraffle 🙁
— Laura Iriarte (@lauralovesart) September 30, 2009Before attending the IBM product launch event, we were treated to a day of collaborative thinking to discuss and document our thoughts about how work is evolving and what the future holds. The day was kicked off with a presentation by noted futurist and best selling author of The Popcorn Report, Faith Popcorn.
Faith predicted, among other things, that:
- The future of human communication is telepathic (per Faith, we know it is possible and will be standard in the coming years),
- By 2016 43% of the U.S. workforce will work from home.
Faith’s first Tweet ever happened on November 6th, 2008. She nailed it.
Painting the landscape of the Future
— Faith Popcorn (@FaithPopcorn) November 6, 2008Our collaborative thinking sessions were led by the incomparable Hendre Coetzee. Hendre does an amazing job of facilitating breakouts and group discussions. I want to have him host workshops at TalentNet soon.
Check out Hendre’s first Tweet. Another great one.
Our first priority – Great Work with Great People!
— Hendre Coetzee (@HendreCoetzee) February 20, 2011
There were so many interesting people among the futurists and facilitation teams that it would take several posts to cover them all. So instead I’ve posted their first tweets below. I would encourage you to follow all of these smart contributors. Most of them have great books and resources available for your reading pleasure.
One shining example is Joel Comm. Joel is the author of Twitter Power and many other best selling books and apps. He recently decided to do a one-week week stint as an UBER driver and document the experience. He also led our karaoke night in Manhattan.
If you want to see some of the ideas that came from our Thinkathon you can get a quick glimpse here. You can also check out these nice posts by my friends Janine Truitt, Brian Fanzo, and Jay Khuns.
First tweets are a funny thing. It seems some are profound while others attempt to play as if they’ve been there the whole time. Still others are prophetic. Some are just silly. But mostly you get a feel for the personality or style of the tweeter.
My advice to first time tweeters: Be profound. Someone may someday embed your first tweet into a blog post.
Behold the fascinating (sort of) first tweets of today’s futurists:
The futurists:
I’m becoming a big fan of John Warrillow…and this blog is no exception: http://bit.ly/9ROe7o
— Mark Babbitt (@MarkSBabbitt) June 24, 2010Posted by resume on Twetter
— Cheryl K. Burgess (@ckburgess) March 23, 2009
Form follows content.
— Thomas Ciszek (@ciszek) August 17, 2010
@Kboschetto I had a similar experience with Comcast. When a customer wants to quit, it’s over… right?
— Ted Coiné (@tedcoine) June 2, 2009
going to bed awaiting a big day tomorrow
— Marsha Collier (@MarshaCollier) April 18, 2008
Checking out twitter for the first time
— Joel Comm (@joelcomm) May 17, 2007
I will start actively tweeting from this handle on Friday afternoon. I will use @Timetobefrank for blog posts. Time to get back into things!
— Frank Eliason (@FrankEliason) July 15, 2010
Created this account for my Social Media & Tech addicition… Follow @Pittsburgh_Fanz for my Sports tweets & @Stee1rz_Fanz for Poker tweets
— Brian Fanzo (@iSocialFanz) July 16, 2012
Hanging out with the kids and getting greared up for the Cowboys game.
— Craig Fisher (@Fishdogs) September 21, 2008
Hey everyone, what’s happening?
— Dion Hinchcliffe (@dhinchcliffe) July 16, 2006
New WGT Blitz Challenge golf games. Fast multi-player games for credits. #wgt http://t.co/HEoTyeSe pic.twitter.com/WNUxUU2n
— worldgolftour (@worldgolftour) March 13, 2012
thinking about Sunday
— David Holzmer (@DavidHolzmer) October 12, 2008
working at the office
— Chris Heuer (@chrisheuer) November 18, 2006
Cornell: We work 30% harder to ensure others remain lower than us. Isnt harder to pull others up better? http://bit.ly/9x5FLG
— Bill Jensen (@simpletonbill) March 7, 2010
Just getting the day started…
— Kevin D. Jones (@KevinDJones) October 3, 2007
Relaxing now… heading to Atlantic Ave. for the Il Bacio event later!
— Chelsea Krost (@ChelseaKrost) July 26, 2009
Back on twitter…hoping the Lightning squeeze into the playoffs
— Jay Kuhns, SPHR (@jrkuhns) March 26, 2010
At #AffiliateSummit in Las Vegas, hope to make it out of here tomorrow!
— Robert Moore (@MediaLabRat) January 11, 2011
I’m working on the 2nd Annual Small Biz Leadership Summit in NYC on 12/8. Going to be even better this year! Save the date.
— Brian Moran (@brianmoran) September 12, 2008
Just entering the world of twitter. Plan to share wisdom, observations, silliness, and connect with my people.
— Shawn Murphy (@TheShawnMurphy) April 27, 2009
Okay…I have given in and created a twitter account. Only follow me if you want to occasionally receive extraordinarily interesting tweets
— Daniel Newman (@danielnewmanUV) December 21, 2010
My first update as 9 inch marketing. I’m no longer a Twitter virgin. Confucius say virginity like balloon . . . one prick, all gone.
— Stan Phelps (@9INCHmarketing) January 18, 2009
@RBWGoSox It’s been helpful for me.
— Jeff Sheehan (@JeffSheehan) April 19, 2009
Googling images of a new client in a poor attempt to assign attributes to their stock photo.
— Mark Stelzner (@stelzner) April 14, 2008
#Recruiting a #Electric #Power #Engineer for #Brookhaven National Lab. #To apply visit http://bit.ly/FcRVm and #apply to job number #15317.
— Janine Truitt (@CzarinaofHR) July 12, 2010
I’m just experimenting with twitter… I guess this is my first tweet!
— Kristina Verner (@kristinaverner) June 7, 2009
Damn you Dylan T Boyd!
— DJ Waldow (@djwaldow) March 27, 2008
I am just getting started with Twitter.
— Kevin Wheeler (@kwheeler) February 15, 2008
TwitBookBlog What Your Best Tweet Up Story? http://tinyurl.com/56c6z5
— Warren Whitlock (@WarrenWhitlock) June 11, 2008PureMatter Team
My first twitter
— Bryan Kramer (@bryankramer) September 28, 2008@bryankramer You know it’s me, right? Yes, your wife has joined the Twitter.
— Courtney Smith (@cshasarrived) April 12, 2012
Trying out this site, but seems a little odd to me.
— Serena Shnayer (@sshnayer) December 5, 2008
amazing launching a new prod and watching with social tools like #radian6 and #hootsuite
— Ryan Campbell (@Bizplantoday) November 7, 2012
@suzimcc Tweeted this:If you had “pass this bill” or “right away” in the jobs speech drinking game, you should report to an ER. Immediately.
— Chris Cillizza (@TheFix) September 8, 2011IBM Hosts & Attendees
@amytennison retweeted:
Dell is #1 in Newsweek Greenest Companies. Story @michaelDell calls Timberland CEO to discuss, leading to business http://bit.ly/aKMEAS
— Dell Social (@SocialatDELL) October 18, 2010
“Ten Great Marketing Blogs | Social Media Today” http://t.co/RbclTxhbOz
— Amber Armstrong (@ambarmstrong) October 26, 2013
@MariaWinans Retweeted:IBM launches the OpenPower Consortium with Google, Nvidia, others to advance Internet-scale data centers http://t.co/16zORtBEu7
— Jon Iwata (@coastw) August 6, 2013
@rdcucre retweeted”03/17/2011 Webcast: Moving to cloud? Integrated Service Management is the Foundation for Managing Cloud http://ow.ly/45R8O #systemz #cloud
— IBM System z Events (@SystemZEvents) March 11, 2011
@nicolekatrana retweeted:#IBM CEO: “A business must be prepared to change everything about itself except its beliefs.” Worth a read: http://ibm.co/emFPrj.
— JP Frenza (@jpfrenza) February 2, 2011
My Katie Bug had her first T Ball game last night and I am the proudest mommy ever!
— Laurie Summers (@ldguy1) June 17, 2009
Happy to be on Twitter! Looking forward to engaging with each and all of you!
— Elizabeth Urheim (@LizUrheim) November 9, 2014
Lots of good announcements from #IBMConnect this morning involving #HRtech #CX #PaaS and #socbiz, but IBM MailNext stole the show buzzwise
— Alan Lepofsky (@alanlepo) January 27, 2014
Tweet Tweet!! I am on Twitter.
— saurabhcalla (@saurabhcalla) July 17, 2008
Dinner in Southbury, CT
— Scott Souder (@sssouder) September 23, 2008
Excited about Encoding.com’s new video encoding service, Vid.ly! Testing out the possibilities!
— Katie Parsons (@katiemparsons) January 25, 2011
Just installed/connected Twirl with help from John
— Sheri Branco (@Sheri_Branco) September 11, 2008
working on design process issues
— Chris Reckling (@creckling) March 21, 2008
Working on 8.5.1 iNotes ultralite; lots of new features to squeeze onto the iPhone
— MEzekiel (@MEzekiel) September 15, 2008
@310Sunshine310 yes I’m here, thank you for the bday wishes!!! Now I have to figure out how Twitter works haha
— Tariq Ahmad (@tariq_ahmad) May 2, 2010
http://www.prnewswire.com/news/index.shtml
— Kristi Eells (@Kristi_Eells) February 26, 2009
Working
— ccrummey (@ccrummey) April 1, 2008
Recruiters remember last Wed is the 29th 8P CST #TalentNet live chat hosted by @fishdogs and @pinkolivefamily; this is the kickoff!
— DFWTRN (@DFWTRN) April 25, 2009Huge thanks to Bryan Kramer, Purematter, and IBM’s Social Business Team for putting this great team and event together.
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Interesting approach to connecting those of us interested in #futureofwork, both the #newwaytowork participants and the many more who will read this. While the 1st tweet is usually not the "best tweet" it's a very authentic experience.
In my case, I had an account for a year before writing Twitter Revolution and setting up my current @WarrenWhitlock account. The tweet was a blog post from a now defunct blog about writing that book, and forwards to another blog (which I had to fix so you won't get a 404 error LOL).
Even looking at my own old stuff, I remembered people and connections I want to revisit. Now expanding to do that on other links here.
Thanks