I'd started writing this post back during the Iranian elections when I was delighted to see the voice that Twitter was giving the oppressed voters of Iran.

Since then Twitter has gone on to prove as equally as powerful a tool and voice of free speech for numerous other causes.

Recently we've seen the Trafigura case and almost on the same day the Jan Moir story recieve the Twitter megaphone treatment.

A publishing tool with the ingredients that Twitter offers has never been available before and it seems those components are ideally suited to the domain of public opinion and free speech.

I spoke recently of Twitter and other social media platforms power to enable human intrigue and self involvement. The adoption of social platforms in these other mentioned cases are tapping into similar elements of the human psyche, those that cause us to express outrage and opinion.

Twitter and it's brief format involves less cognitive involvement and effort to enable the expression of opinion than the writing of blog articles or an Amnesty International style fax campaign.

The viral nature of the RT and then promotion or highlighting of a news event in the trending topics creates a buzz about the network that encourages all users to investigate further and perhaps get involved in the process themselves.

Its multi-interface availability and relatively simple API and publish process allow it to produce content from locations that might otherwise be problematic, bypassing issues of political censorship or mobility.

The most commonly used applications and the Twitter web interface are simple to use, allowing most with even the most basic grasp of technology to get involved in a trending topic or developing news item quickly.

There is however a downside or at least another side to this simple and readily available functionality.

With the same ease that some people access a story in order to add a positive element to a campaign, others can access it to add not so positive input to a campaign.

Towards the end of the Jan Moir story, or the orchestrated campaign as she so named it, there was an uglier side to some peoples involvement. One driven by emotive passion, I suspect in most cases, with physical threats to Jan Moir apparently appearing. I didn't witness these, but I'm not surprised or alarmed that they did occur.

With this easy access will inevitably come other opinions that might not please all, but hey this is the nature of free speech. As with the printed press in this country, of which Jan Moir is a contributor, there are plenty of articles published that we won't all agree with.

The latest case of unfounded repute is currently doing the rounds, with Twitter seemingly reporting the demise of rapper Kayne West.

It is it's own beast. This is the beauty of Twitter that will continue to keep it in the public spotlight, much to the delight of many and the annoyance of a few.

Is there a one-size-fits-all Twitter strategy? Contrary to popular belief and snake-oil Twitter schemes, there is not. Jeremiah Owyang, a Forrester Analyst says, picking a strategy for your business or organization doesn’t have to be hard. It really depends on your goals.

Currently there are five Twitter strategies Owyang see working well for businesses and organizations:

• Listening to your customers.
• Spreading your message.
• Selling products or services; announcing discounts and deals.
• Supporting your customers by addressing their problems.
• Collaborating with customers on product/service development.

The idea is to pick one and concentrate on it. Learn it. Leverage it. Use it.

Here’s how they fit into larger strategies:

Listening. Use search.twitter.com, or other listening tools to monitor what’s being said our your brand and company. Talk directly to your customers. Create a dialogue and give them information they can use.

• JetBlu and Southwest promote flight deals and send out company news.
• Rubbermaid and Dunkin’ Doughnuts listens and responds to consumer chatter.
• Dell sold $1 million in merchandise and promotes discounts on its products.

Energize. Find and engage brand advocates to do the “heavy” lifting for you.

• Zappo harvests a feed where its name is used by others and publishes it on the company website.

Support. Engage customers and provide and interactive channel they can use to stay connect to your company and reach real people anytime they want.

• Comcast does this with ComcastCares. The company monitors Twitter for customer complaints and addresses openly. By the way, they fix them too.

Enhance. Ask customers for immediate feedback.

Ever wanted to make an interesting Twitter background? Here's how I did it.

Side note: This post comes to you straight from an email reply to fellow long-time podcaster Michael Geoghegan in regards to my Twitter background.

Also of note, this layout works best on higher res monitor settings. I imagine that most active Twitter users that are going to be viewing the site as opposed to sms or mobile versions are on high res settings. That said, let's roll.

Creating your background
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File Dimensions: 2048 px by 1707 px (no clue why i used these dimensions but I am sure I knew what I was doing at the time)
Branding Dimensions: 80 px by 587 px
Coordinates: X=20, Y=14
Horizontal position: 20 px from the left (give yourself some padding)
Vertical position: 14 px from the top (will line up your graphic with the top of the twitter logo. our eyes like symmetry) File size and type according to Twitter: "Images must be smaller than 800k. GIF, JPG, PNG."

Aesthetics
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Color palette: Pick colors that match that with default Twitter stylesheet colors. If they contrast too much follow the Change Background directions above and change the colors for Text, Name, Link, Sidebar fill and Sidebar border as needed.
Recommendation: Choose colors that work with the default and save yourself the headache of matching the CSS to your image. Follow Twitter's lead.

Uploading your background
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Change Default Background: Login and click 'Settings' >> click 'Design' >> Select 'Use my custom style below' radio button >> Upload your image

It took me quite a bit of time to get a background image that I was happy with. There was a lot of editing and uploading again, and again until I got it right. I would suspect if you're like me your experience will be much the same. So have patience when getting it just right. And remember that you are working within someone else's website and can't control all the features.

Update: This is the background that I based this tutorial on - Croncast background all by itself if you want to use it as a guide.

Here's my current background at work (note: it is now free-form) - http://twitter.com/croncast.

just try it........I'm sure its working

There have been multiple reports that Twitter could replace Google. Twitter has quickly risen to become one of the most powerful sources on the Web. In 2008 alone, Compete found that the microblogging service grew 752 percent. Do you think this might make Google, the long-standing Internet giant, a tad-bit nervous or jealous?

Chris Brogan says, “…I think Google is a bit envious. I think they don’t know what to do with it all yet.”

Does this mean that Google is letting their feelings influence how they return Twitter results? There have been some rumors that Google may let the “authority” of Twitter users play a role in their results. For example, a celebrity or a well-known “authority” such as Chris Brogan could rank higher in Google results than an average Joe user.

Do you think Google is jealous of Twitter? If so, what do you think the company’s next move will be?