NIC HARALAMBOUS

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Bloggers like to be restricted, twitter is proof

I'm beginning to believe that I like to be restricted. And in fact I am begining to think that it's not just me but a lot of people online, tweeting, blogging, evangelising, guru-ing and the rest also like a bit of a restrictive challenge.I have a newfound theory that I actually like to get told what to do and how to do it within certain perameters. Yes you could say that I am actually searching for guidance to lead me to my expressive peak. But I could also argue that I like to be restricted.Bloggers like limits, like challenges and inherently might like to be restricted. It's a challenge and it's a limitation that we think we can try to exploit. Let's be honest, every twitterer loves the feeling of writing a full and comprehensive tweet in exactly 140 characters. I know I do. But what does that actually mean?The explosion of Twitter (What is twitter?) has really made me think about what I do, what I like to do and how I like to do it. I used to write very expansive posts, in depth analysis on a wide variety of topics. With the advent of Twitter and its subsequent success I've realised that keeping it short works. This, whether coincidental or directly relative, is restricting my post lengths, my thoughts and the angle of my approach.Maybe this movement towards tweets and restricted 140 character posts is a step back, a calm before the storm, the time where we all gain a little bit of restrictive perspective and realise that our verbose and pedantic ramblings aren't always what we think they are - effective.Maybe I need to go back to the basics and realise that most people in our country have never used the internet, let alone know what twitter is, 140 characters mean in the "bigger picture", what a blog is or who's poking who on which social network.What I am getting at (cause I am now rambling) is that maybe restrictions are good because they allow us to expirement within the constraints of a predermined rule. One that we are then able to work within and break out of.At some point we have all followed the Godins, Scobles, crunches, readwrites and the like. But they have no clue what our market is looking for. We are not restricting ourselves enough to one specific focus. This is just a fleeting thought, not a steadfast opinion that I have. But surely if we began to tailor-make our products, blog posts, startups, ideas, ideals and innovations to 140 characters (don't be literal) then maybe we would see more success.