See the Power of Twitter
Nine Simultaneous Real-Time Freedom-Related Searches of the Twitterstream

I think this demonstration of the power of real-time searches will be an eye-opener for many readers of this blog.

Twitter can be thought of as a massive group email system with millions of users. The email messages are accessible by anyone who cares to take a look on the Internet. Real-time keyword searches can be conducted on the Twitterstream to reveal what's being posted on any topic you care to follow.

I've found Tweetgrid to be a very powerful research tool. It provides for nine, simultaneous, real-time keyword searches visible on your display at once. See an example of this below. The Tweetgrid image below is a jpeg of a particular group of nine searches I performed as a demonstration. Click here or on the image itself to view an actual live demonstration of the nine real-time searches (Here's a short URL for this Tweetgrid demonstration search: http://is.gd/1P5UY).

As you can see, I've set up searches for the John Birch Society (#jbs) and other freedom-oriented organizations, such as Campaign for Liberty (#c4l), Top Conservatives on Twitter (#tcot), Tea Party groups (#teaparty), and 9-12 Project groups (#912). The abbreviations in parentheses are what's known on Twitter as "hashtags." Hashtags help people doing searches on Twitter to find relevant Tweets (Twitterspeak for the 140-character microblogs which people post on Twitter).

Along the last row of three I've set up searches to keep up with the latest regarding three very important issues in Congress, ratification of the Law of the Sea Treaty (LOST), the government takeover aspects of healthcare reform, and cap and trade. Try watching this Tweetgrid demo search for a few minutes, see new Tweets popping up, and click on interesting links. Be careful, you might get hooked on this type of searching!

You can set up your own searches merely by clicking on one of the nine search boxes, deleting what's there, and typing in your own search term or phrase. Click on "Full Address" or "Short URL" at the top of the screen to reveal the URL of your customized search grid. One useful alternate search to put into one of the nine search boxes is "@[your Twitter user name]." This way you can immediately see any Tweets which include your user name.

I've found that searches of the Twitterstream are the best way to find out the latest videos and blogs on important issues.

I'd be interested to hear from anyone who has found this blog on Tweetgrid searches to be useful.