I recently signed up to Jaiku. For an in depth description of what Jaiku is and why it’s kinda neat, I suggest you read my colleague Mads’ post on it (and on why it is better than Twitter, a similar service) – he’s the one who convinced me to sign up.
In short Jaiku is a lot like Twitter. But whereas Twitter is an sms-based service, Jaiku is an app that lets you post tiny (140 characters) status messages called Jaikus from your mobile phone or from your personal Jaiku page online – these messages are then visible to your friends on their phones and online. See my Jaiku page for an example. You can also subscribe to feeds from within Jaiku. Updates to these are then posted as ‘Jaikus’. Oh, and that tiny little box in the right column of my blog – that’s a ‘presence badge’ from Jaiku. It displays my latest posts in the sidebar of my blog.
But what’s the point of all this, then?
Well, services like Twitter and Jaiku kinda split the crowd down the middle. Some people – like my colleague Mads, for instance, think they’re excellent, some think they’re horrible and others – and this I think is the largest group – don’t get them. I tended to agree with Stephen Davies over at PRblogger, who basically thinks they’re pointless, but then I tried Jaiku on for size.
Now, at the touch of a few buttons on my celly, I’ve updated my blog and given my Jaiku contacts an update on what I’m up to (I have way too few Jaiku contacts as of now, so feel free to add me if you’re already on Jaiku). It’s good fun, and it allows me to spew tiny thoughts even when I’m not on my laptop. I thoroughly enjoy that.
Jaiku’s self-proclaimed mission is to: ‘bring people closer together by enabling them to share their presence’ – it works! So my advice would be to try it before you knock it. It may not be for everyone, but you may just like it.
Man, this post ended up kind of a mess… Maybe I should’ve written a Jaiku instead – it would have been something along the lines of: ‘liking Jaiku – do try it’ – short and sweet.
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I do think it’s excellent. Some people don’t get it – hell, a lot of people didn’t get blogging either.
The beauty about this thing – be it Twitter or Jaiku – is that people can use it however they want. It’s not locked in any way (apart from the limited text entry).
One of the founders of Jaiku calls it “social peripheral vision” – I think that’s a spot on term. It’s exactly what it’s about – keeping up with your friends in a non-invasive way. I really do believe this way of communicating is going to be big.
I agree,
But much like with blogging – or a number of other activities – i really think this calls for people to jump in and do it. Actively. Then the whole point of it seems to become clearer…
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