In the fourth week of LIBR 285 course, we were asked to find an example of an archive that uses Twitter well to communicate with its patrons.
I looked up Internet Archive and Computer History Museum (in Moutain View, CA).
The links are:
http://twitter.com/#!/internetarchive
http://twitter.com/#!/ComputerHistory
The Internet Archive has 8904 followers, definitely not as many as Smithsonian Archive but definitely a lot. Computer Hisotyr Museum also has a good number of followers - 3405. The Internet Archive seems to be using Twitter to promote its collections. Many of the tweets point to news articles and blog posts that talk about launch of new collections and many directly point to the collections on the Internet Archive Web site. I am sure the Internet Archive is trying to reach out to the general public especially with tweets that talk about their collections related to 9/11 coverage. Somewhat humorous tweets such as "I can't be the only one who thinks that having a teapot in your bedside table is an excellent innovation! http://bit.ly/pr6yEq" seem to be tapping into the curiosity of the general public.
The Computer History Museum also is reaching out to the general public and is promoting its collections by tweeting about its new collections. Since it's also a physical museum, it also uses Twitter to promote special events and discounts for museum visits. I can't imagine microblogging about special events, collections and newsletters once or twice a day could take that long but the little post on Twitter goes out to thousands of followers. So I think it definitely is a very efficient way of marketing.
BTW, I'd created Twitter account a while back when I was talking LIBR 240 but haven't really used it much since then. As soon as I logged in, I tried to look for some friends but haven't found that many. More are on Facebook but I do definitely see the benefits in following some of the professional organizations. Here's my account: http://twitter.com/#!/jungahlee, if anybody's interested!
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