Earlier this week I read a blog post by Bora Zivkovic titled Twittering is a difficult art form – if you are doing it right (which started with a tweet by Aaron Naparstek) and followed his link to Jay Rosen’s blog post from a year ago, Mindcasting: defining the form, spreading the meme. Rosen tweeted about it this week, too.
I also re-read the March 2009 article in the LA Times, On Twitter, mindcasting is the new lifecasting.
- Mindcasting (WordSpy definition): “Posting a series of messages that reflect one’s current thoughts, ideas, passions, observations, readings, and other intellectual interests.”
- Lifecasting (Zivkovic definition): “to be in a continuous presence in a community of one’s liking.” Rosen extreme example: “what you had for breakfast or how much you hate Mondays.”
All this helped me rethink my own use of social media:
- On my Wigley and Associates blog and my @griff_wigley Twitter account: 99% business-related mindcasting
- On our Locally Grown Northfield blog and podcast, @logronfld Twitter account, and Locally Grown Northfield Facebook page: a balance of civic-related mindcasting and Northfield-related lifecasting (my public social life in Northfield)
- On our Valley Pond Townhome Association blog: neighborhood-related lifecasting (my public social life in my neighborhood)
- On my Wigleys of Mendota and Northfield blog and my personal Griff Wigley Facebook account: 99% lifecasting.
Among the people I follow on Twitter for business and civic-related issues, I don’t mind a little lifecasting (5%), especially among those who tweet several times a day.
But I always unfollow anyone whose mix of tweets feels like a balance of lifecasting and mindcasting (unless they’re a family member or close friend) because then they’re expecting me to relate to their whole life… and I just don’t have the personal bandwidth for that.
