I always think that its all very well and good having an opinion about something, or a subject you wish to talk about, but without anyone to listen to you, you may easily go unheard. A hefty part of a journalist"s success derives from the potential size of the readership one can access. Simply, if nobody is there to listen then you may go unheard.
To this end, another part of a news reporter"s job is to actively access the maximum readership possible, basically anything short of going cold war, flying a microlight whilst dropping copies of the article. Increasingly, Twitter is being used for this purpose, sending short tweets to each of the people that follow you, highlighting your state of mind, mood, or an article you have written and wish people to read.
This popular social networking site, Twitter has hit news this week, well perhaps not Twitter exactly but instead an advertising firm named "uSocial". The people at uSocial promise Twitter users without much of an audience, to find them an abundance of followers who will eagerly listen, or rather read anything that they are likely to say. However, all things come at a price and you have to throw a few pound notes on the table to boost your followers.
Followers are available in blocks starting at $87 (£53) for 1,000. The biggest block uSocial is selling is 100,000 people and take varying times to appear as followers. Information regarding pricing at time lengths can be found here.
However, its not as simple as just getting people to begin following you. uSocial also specially profiles where people are so it can more closely match users with those they might want to follow. The marketing company then messages potential followers telling them about the new Twitter user they might want to follow, however there is nothing to say that they have to.
This is an interesting idea for businesses or start up bloggers who wish to gain a boosted community or readership. Though, I do think that if you have to buy friends, they may not be the kindest ones in the world regardless of the fact that they have been "specially" selected. Surely the point of micro blogging is to be able to quickly keep in touch with your friends, the last thing I would like is for people I don"t know being specially informed of my raging hangover one afternoon.