Social media, ODTUG, and you

He ain’t heavy, he’s my brother

Well, my younger, taller, smarter brother-who-isn’t-really my brother.  I am of course referring to my almost-doppelganger, Martin D’Souza.  

Why am I mentioning a non-EPM Oracle ACE Director and fellow ODTUG board member on this blog?  Well, there is the resemblance (I actually don’t think so but I’ve had people ask me how things are in Calgary and I live in the US of A), but it’s really because of what Martin has done:  he’s put ODTUG’s Oracle blogs on Twitter.

Social media – useless or awesome?  Discuss.

Yes, Twitter, the place where people go to get bullied, follow vapid, shallow, and beyond-useless celebrities, and of course look at pictures of cats.  At first blush, it does seem all a bit pointless if you have but a scintilla of a brain, but in fact it is of value for sharing technical information.  As an example, ODTUG has a Twitter feed, ODTUG’s EPM community social media leader Jennifer Anderson has a Twitter feed on all things EPM, and even yr. obt. svt. has a feed.  All of what we post is serious (well, mostly) and I’m pretty sure we don’t fall victim to Twitter’s more pernicious attributes.  The push nature of Twitter makes sharing information easy.

ODTUG and Martin make it better

And now it’s even better, thanks to Martin.  He has generously donated his time and expertise to build a dynamic feed of blog posts to your actually-quite-useful Twitter account.  Awesome, not-bro!

What does this mean?  

ODTUG has blog aggregators for each of its communities:  Apex, BI, Development, DBA, ADF, and of course our beloved EPM.  Before the Twitter push feature, you had to visit the ODTUG website.  While there is nothing wrong with this approach, it takes time, it must be actively done, and it is not at all great on a mobile device.  

And now?  Get a Twitter account, install the application on your device, and away you go, getting useful information without even lifting a finger.  

Get there firstest, with the mostest

Still reading?  Why? Shouldn’t you be off following @orclepmblogs?  Looking for tweets with the #orclepm hashtag?  Not spending time reading blogs…whoops, okay, keep doing that.

Seriously, every man jack of us is busy, sometimes ridiculously so.  Staying abreast of technical news, information, and announcements is a vital part of our jobs.  The work Martin has done for ODTUG makes it all that much easier.  

Be seeing you.