I have been really learning and enjoying all the posts about Twitter today coming through my newsreader, including one from Stephen Collins of AcidLabs, Is it brandjacking if you come in late and don’t ask nicely? While the post is about Brandjacking, which is interesting, I responded to this little excerpt:

With all the attention now surrounding Twitter, it seems that every brand and celebrity under the sun suddenly is or wants to be represented on it and every other social network. It seems as if the business world has finally read Cluetrain and wants to be in the bazaar engaging in the conversation.

But the fact is that while some brands have been engaging in the conversation for quite some time – Zappos, Dell, Comcast and others come to mind – others have only recently realised that this conversation even exists. And worse, they don’t seem to realise that there are a few rules that define how you engage in that conversation.

That was awesome — that is awesome! I have been a fan of The Cluetrain Manifesto and also The Cathedral and the Bazaar for for a decade and I think it is really important to return all of this Twitter hype back to basics.  Here are the first 6 theses of 99 of the Cluetrain Manifesto:

1. Markets are conversations.
2. Markets consist of human beings, not demographic sectors.
3. Conversations among human beings sound human. They are conducted in a human voice.
4. Whether delivering information, opinions, perspectives, dissenting arguments or humorous asides, the human voice is typically open, natural, uncontrived.
5. People recognize each other as such from the sound of this voice.
6. The Internet is enabling conversations among human beings that were simply not possible in the era of mass media.

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