My wife has accused me of twittering for years, now I can almost do it for a living.

In my lifetime I have seen communication go from a handwritten note thanking relatives for Christmas presents to sending words and pictures round the world in an instant.

A great part of the marvel we call the Internet is the emergence of what has become known as social networking. You can Twitter, Reddit, Facebook, Flickr, My Space and if you are in Taiwan it is likely that you Plurk!

Twitter and Facebook are perhaps the best known names although My Space is enjoying a revival. It’s really all about a mixture of self marketing, meeting people, information and fun, and what is wrong with that?

Leading personalities often use Twitter which is a utility which lets you say as little or as much as you wish about what you are doing. Some have huge followings and there was recently extensive media coverage when actor and broadcaster Stephen Fry took exception to his treatment at the hands of another Twitterer and threatened to leave!

I twittered recently but haven’t had a chirrup of a response so I’m giving it a rest for a while until I have divine inspiration to write about my mundane existence in purple prose which brings the masses flocking to my page. Do not hold your breath.

One of the beauties of networking is that it is instant. How else can you play Scrabble with someone in Australia, send pictures of a new baby to Hong Kong, check the weather in Sydney with a local and demolish a pile of plastic bricks on screen?

The Third Age web site is a wonderful example of social networking bringing together people from across the world. In our forums we have members from Australia, New Zealand, Switzerland, Kentucky, Yorkshire and even Hull!

It is now the age where you can actually get more entertainment from your computer screen than your television. There is more choice and it is virtually free.

The technological advances with hand held computers and mobile phones mean that there is 24-hour accessibility to social networking and one can hardly walk down the street today without seeing masses of people with objects plugged into almost every bodily orifice.

Even the face of the media has changed immensely due to the immediate availability of a myriad of sources of information and networking. True, there are darker moments when, for instance, a site may be used for slightly suspect purposes. But overall we should seize the opportunities offered by this technological explosion. Go on, have a twitter!

Editor, Third Age.