Senator Edward M. Kennedy’s family used twitter (and a website) to update details about arrangements, who would speak at the Friday memorial service and famous Edward Kennedy quotes.  (Funeral photos / Funeral Program)

Through the use of twitter and their website, the family was able to keep people directly informed and make information available to people who could not attend in person.  This gave the family the ability to manage events related information in a way that could not have been done had the coverage been left entirely to the press.

(This post is in no way an endorsement of Senator Edward Kennedy’s views, opinions or actions and is merely an observation of how twitter is being used as it becomes an ever more central part of how we communicate.)

More of @kennedynews tweets after the jump:

Share this post on twitter!

My friend @johnhaydon shows how to find a twitter user’s RSS feed:

RSS is a way to subscribe to a blog or twitter account, etc. so that it comes to you rather than you clicking on bookmarks or a link to go there.  Here’s a great one page explanation of RSS (Rich Site Summary).

You’ll need an RSS reader to use RSS feeds.  The quickest and easiest way to get started with RSS is get an account with google (if you use gmail you already have an account), go here to log into google reader and away you go!

Here’s a Beginner’s Guide to Google Reader

and here’s a quick look at my Google Reader Page:

Continuing change means new options to consider:

One new result of rapidly converging trends is the mobile restaurant or Restaurant 2.0:

Cupcake Stop Truck in NYC

Following the example of digital delivery, and driven by the factors listed below, we will begin to see an increase in physical delivery of services to the customer. 

Even restaurants are being swept up in the sea change swirling around us today.  The mobile restaurant is a new development of our times:

The drivers of this new culinary entrepreneurial development are:

• Twitter – Mobile restaurants can economically broadcast where they are as well as where they will be.  Also narcissistic consumers can tell people they are waiting for a truck to serve them .
• GPS Technology – To help locate restaurants on wheels.
• The Recession – Gives hard hit businesses the spark to innovate new approaches to serve their clients, causes consumers to be thrifty in their choices for “eating out”, and amplifies the high cost of gas to drive to a restaurant.

What’s next?

• Crowdsourcing – the truck can converge on the location most tweeted about.
• iPhone & Mobile Apps – Will show you which restaurant trucks are in your area, sorted by cuisine, location and length of the line.
• Tweeting a Password – For a Free topping or appetizer on special days.
• Selection specialization – Trucks will tweet their “Daily Special”, with different selections on different days (of course influenced by the desires of the twitterverse.)
• Mobile Businesses in a truck – These “businesses in a truck” would offer quick response to a request for their services by travelling to their client while also taking advantage of twitter, GPS and mobile restaurants to schedule their en-route meals

Of course these mobile restaurants would be most well received and most effective in metropolitan areas such as NYC (at least in the beginning.) 

Twitter is sorta like your own radio station, rather than pay for advertising spots on the radio, just tweet your message!

Related Links:

NYC Waffle Truck on Twitter,  Sharing Restaurant Space Saves Energy,

@waffletruck (waffle truck on twitter)

Temporary Spaces and Creative Infill, Things to See in NY – Cupcakes on Wheels,

Turf War at the Hot Dog Cart