The winning side of Twitter

By Lauren Crothers

I'm no technophobe.

At a newspaper I used to work for I spent a big chunk of time on the multimedia desk working on daily podcasts, putting together video reports and working on the web desk.

But it took me a while to join Twitter.

Initially, I was fastidiously against the idea of it. Many of the updates I'd seen were of the "I'm making some toast," "I'm going to the loo," "I'm doing my homework," variety. Ugh. Who cares?

I dug in my heels - happy to be a pariah in a world of tweeting journos - but eventually I caved.

How else was I ever going to be 'socially' connected to Charlie Brooker?

Until now, there's been no tangible benefit to my participation with the site. Until now. For yesterday, I won the Digital Journalist's Handbook by Mark Luckie of 10,000 Words. He is giving away copies of the book this week and the first to correctly reply to a question he asks - this one was about cameras, how perfect - wins a copy.

Anyone whose book cover is in the same colour family as those ruler-like things you could snap and wrap around your wrist in the 80s (what were they called??) is a friend of mine. Aesthetics aside, I'm really looking forward to reading this book. For all the experience I've gained to date, there's always more I could know and I hope to glean such information from this read.

And in an ever changing and increasingly competitive industry, it never hurts to stay on top of your game.

Lauren Crothers is a Star copy editor with one eye behind a lens. lcrothers@thestar.ca