Twitter is my Boba Tea.

Have you ever been to a smoothie joint, or one of those asian tea places and ordered a drink with “boba” in it?  If so, you know that boba are these marble sized balls of tapioca that they put into your drink of choice.  Then they have to give you a special fat straw, because these slimey spheres would instantly clog a regular straw.

So as you start to take your first sip of this beverage (I usually go for a smoothie with some combination of mango and another fruit), you are surprised–although it’s not like you can’t see the buggars–by about 4 or 5 boba balls leaping up the straw and into your mouth.  You then have to sort of chew on them…or if you want, they’ll just slide on down your throat.

If you have never experienced boba, or even if you have only tried it once or twice, you are saying to yourself: what’s the point?  That doesn’t sound very enjoyable at all!

You might also feel the same way about twitter.  This farily new (actually it’s about a year old, which makes it old school in the internet world) web-phenomenon where you can post your answer to the question “What are you doing” in 140 characters or less.

Again…what’s the point?  That doesn’t sound fun?  I don’t get it?!?!Twitter and boba,  both share a strange trait, in that they are both “acquired tastes.”  Strange at first, even awkward, but once you try it a few times, you start to become addicted–even obsessed!  I will leave the boba tasting up to you, but here are a few reasons why I am addicted to twitter:

1) No need to be eloquent!  You’ve got 140 characters to say your piece.  It’s not like it needs to be Pulitzer material.

2) Finding stuff.  People use twitter to send links to interesting stuff around the web.  Good times!

3) Meeting people.  Since everything seems to revolve around “the almighty network” twitter is a cool place to find friends in similar industries.

4) Twhirl.  Oh man, just when I was starting to get hooked, I download twhirl, now I’m really hooked!  Twitter clients like this one let you “tweet” with friends almost like instant messaging.  They only difference is that the rest of the world can see your conversation.

5) Shameless self promotion.  In all honesty, I started tweeting because a friend suggested I use it to help build links to our website at work.

Sometimes (like just now) I have to check myself and not get too silly on my work account, and save the antics for my personal one.  I forget that I’m representing more than myself on there, and that it is entirely possible (although highly unlikely that my wit and charm would be a turn-off to potential clients; *sigh.

But do yourself a solid.  Try twitter.  Try boba.  Both very weird at first, but addicting after a few rounds.