Crazy for Twitter?

Check out the new Forrester Research study about the rise of social media spending. The economic downturn has forced marketers (and most everyone) to be more innovative. It's accepted wisdom that creativity flourishes in hard times.

BUT, is the rise of social media a great leap forward for a beleaguered economy? Or is is just fulfilling a human need for outrageous speculation? Evan and I are both a little skeptical about applications like Twitter. How long will people stay excited about participating in an information community of 98-percent blather? And yet recent numbers from Nielsen Online show that it is growing at 1,382%. While we at Amalgam are questioning this trend, it makes us no less inquisitive about it than everyone else in the digital world. I tweet, I link in, I facebook, I blog.

So: Can social media balance its truly social beginnings with being a workaday marketing tool?