Fine, I'll Twitter

So I've been Twittering a little lately. Just a little bit here and there for the last week and a half. I have to say, I don't find it addicting the way so many people claim to but I don't hate it the way I had anticipated. I'd call myself a casual and lukewarm Twitterer but a Twitterer nevertheless.

I resisted Twitter for a long time for a few reasons. First of all, I sometimes feel like I am public enough when it comes to the Internet. I often joke with the Loaded crew that I am the Rachael Ray of technology journalism. Not that I don't like Rachael Ray but I think she is grossly overexposed and I would hate for people to feel the law of diminishing returns when it comes to my online persona.

Another reason I resisted Twitter was the same reason that I don't blog on this site as often as I should. It is a lot of pressure to continuously produce content, especially for someone like me who produces content all day every day for a living. I have a daily news show, keep my Facebook status updated, and blog regularly. At the end of the day, I'm pretty tapped out of original thoughts.

Beyond the pressure to produce regular content is the pressure to produce interesting content. What if we all discover that I'm really not that interesting? That secret, by the way, is one that my family considers long-since out.

Finally, I really don't need the distraction. I am one busy girl. I am in a perpetual state of email bankruptcy, sleep deprivation, and being overwhelmed. I don't have time to hear about strangers and their cat feeding schedules. I barely have time for the people I love. This weekend my sister put her arm around me and said, "Lets talk about how you're going to devote more time to me."

Despite all of these valid reasons not to Twitter, I am doing it anyway. My reasons to Twitter are few but they include sheer curiosity, a desire to see if my random thoughts really do have a forum, and peer pressure from Cali Lewis. Besides, I had a Lucille Ball moment yesterday as I was emailing from my iPhone and trying to cross the street in SoHo. I tripped in front of a stoplight full of cars in a supremely ungraceful way. I looked around for someone to laugh with but no New Yorker seemed game for that. So I Twittered. I have to say, it was a marginally fulfilling outlet. I'll keep at it but don't say I didn't warn you if you find me uninteresting! :)

If you want to follow my Twitters, you can find them here.

CNBC Power Lunch and Breakfast

As promised, my segment from yesterday's CNBC Power Lunch is here. This piece is about Massive Multiplayer Online Role Playing Games (MMORPG). I'll admit, I don't play MMOs but CNBC asked me to come on to explain this for the non-gamer. I hope I did this genre of gamers justice despite the fact that I stumbled over the acronym a little in the beginning and got the name of Curt Schilling's gaming company wrong. I confused it with my friend's party promotion company in San Francisco. D'oh! Anyway, I hope you enjoy a little Power Lunch. I'm going to go find myself some power breakfast now.

The Filter and CNBC

My beta account to The Filter was just activated this morning. I was really excited to try this out because I am always looking for a better music and entertainment recommendation engine and I am a fan of Peter Gabriel, who is one of the masterminds behind this project. I covered it on this episode of Loaded in March.

Having spent less than five minutes on the site, I am not able to get a real grasp of it yet. My first impression is that it seems a little labor intensive. It wants me to rate too many artists and genres in order for it to get a sense of what I might like. I’ll play with it more this weekend and give you a more thought-out opinion.

Meanwhile, I am heading to 30 Rock today to go on CNBC’s Power Lunch this afternoon at 1:15 p.m. Eastern. I’ll post a link later this afternoon or this weekend. I may not have time this afternoon actually because my very favorite shopping buddy is visiting from San Francisco! Besides, this lovely Spring New York weather screams out to me: “Don’t work on a Friday afternoon, Natali. Have a late girls lunch and go shopping.” I guess I will have to oblige!

Musical Inspiration

When I was in journalism school, it was considered very bad form to miss 60 Minutes. Because of this, I have long-since considered the program to be the standard that all reporting should strive to emulate. With very few exceptions, I have not missed an episode of 60 Minutes in nearly ten years.

I always learn something about the world when I watch 60 Minutes. Often times I find myself feeling angry, helpless, desperate, or fascinated by a 60 Minutes piece. Tonight, one segment in particular left me feeling inspired. The piece I am referring to is about a youth outreach program in Venezuela called El Sistema. It teaches poor children how to play classical music. WordPress won't let me embed the CBS video player but you can watch the piece here.

This segment was aired last weekend but my DVR recorded the final hour of the Masters tournament instead. I had to seek this out on the 60 Minutes Web site and I'm really glad I did. I had heard of El Sistema from a previous 60 Minutes segment about the conductor, Gustavo Dudamel. I am thankful that the show's producers decided to profile the youth program separately because it is really touching. I hope you find 12 minutes in your night/day to watch this. It is not often that we get a chance to see tangible ways to make the world a better place. Tocar y luchar.

The Today Show Today

In case you missed it, click here to watch my segment on today's episode of The Today Show.

I had prepared to talk about ten Web sites that can save you time but the segment only allowed for three. A few of my other choices that didn't make the cut: Mint, FlightStats, NEXTbus, Read Later, and FriendFeed.

Going on The Today Show was a great way to kick off my weekend. Well, that and the egg and cheese breakfast wrap that I took from the green room to eat at my desk with my vanilla chai! I'm going to guest host The 404 podcast now. Tune in or watch live if you can!

Have a great weekend blogosphere!