First came e-mail. Then text messaging and instant messaging. Blogging followed. Now micro-blogging is taking off.
To share life's big and small moments with the world, or just a handful of friends, more people are sending frequent short messages on dozens of micro-blogging sites that are popping up, including San Francisco's Twitter and Helsinki-based Jaiku.
Micro-blogging is gaining so much steam that users of Twitter have developed their own lingo - a post is called a tweet, users are dubbed twitterers and the cyberspace they take up is referred to as the twitosphere.
Fans have created more than 100 applications for Twitter, including one for the iPhone and another that uses Google Maps to illustrate where twitterers are posting from (Twittervision.com).
Posts, which are usually between 140 and 200 characters long and can be sent by cellphone to those who have signed up to receive them, can range from abstract thought to answering basic questions like, "What are you doing now?"
Messages can also be routed to people on other networking sites such as Facebook and MySpace, and there are even sites that track Twitter news, such as Twittown.com and Twitterati.tv.
Micro-blogging is the next step in the evolution of social networks such as Facebook and MySpace, some tech watchers say.
"We live almost tribally - it's all about staying in touch with your digital tribe on a moment-by-moment basis," said Andy Walker, technology author and co-host of the online program Lab Rats (Labrats.tv).
Twitter brings networks like Facebook into the present, he says.
"Facebook is much more about reconnecting to your past," he adds.
And it's not just kids who are catching micro-blogging fever. Adopters include professionals and politicians such as U.S. presidential hopefuls Barack Obama and John Edwards, who use it to keep followers up-to-date from the campaign trail.
The attraction of micro-blogging, say devotees, is its simplicity, the ability to post using cellphones and the breezy nature of the short entries.
Frank Linhares, a political adviser to the New Democratic Party and self-professed geek who produces an online program called Digital Underground, says he uses his BlackBerry to send SMS messages to his Jaiku account, which instantly updates his network of friends and acquaintances.
"You can do it anywhere, any time," Mr. Linhares says.