You can follow DANA on Twitter and stay up to date with current ATOD information and events!
If you already have a Twitter account just scroll midway down on the right hand side of this page, just below the Facebook logo, and become a “follower” of @DANAnews1 by clicking on the “Follow” button.
If you are new to Twitter a brief summary of how it works might be helpful. It is an online network that lets us send and read text-based posts of up to 140 characters. These are known as “tweets” and they are a bit like sending SMS messages.
To begin with you need to set up a Titter account by going to http://twitter.com and following the easy step-by-step instructions
Then you are free to “follow” your interests. For instance @DANAnews1 (DANA’s Twitter name) is presently “following”
- Dept of Health and Aging
- Narcotics Anonymous
- Alcoholics Anonymous
- AERF
- RCNA
- Moosk74
- Medical Observer
- NZ doctor news
- APSAD conference
- AMA
- AIHW
- ACMHN
- Alcohol Research
Over time you also gather “followers”; people who are interested in what you have to tweet. They in turn will often “re-tweet” information that you have tweeted. This is how word travels really fast, in moments, around the world. The more you use Twitter the more its possibilities become apparent.
“So what?” I hear you asking. Well you can find out really quickly what is going on with the people, organisations and matters that interest you, often by following a link on a selected “tweet” to an internet site for more information. You can also use Twitter to promote issues of interest e.g. it is a great vehicle to get news about the DANA Conference (or any conference for that matter) out to a large audience and then have them visit the DANA website for more information. Before his surgery of 2 weeks ago Kevin Rudd was busily tweeting on behalf of the RSPCA’s fundraiser in conjunction with Twinning’s tea. They managed to raise in the vicinity of $500,000. Sadly in the UK last week we are also saw how Twitter and Facebook could be used in a destructive way.
If you would like to know more be sure to leave a comment on this website.