Nice piece in the NYTimes on microblogging... For me, while brevity is efficient it isn't necessarily effective.
I don't buy the argument that "ONE hundred forty characters — the exact length of this sentence — is turning out to be just right for business communications of all kinds". For certain kinds of communications, it might be. Say, quick project updates etc.
But for other communications - say an employee email on bonuses - context via a little length makes all the difference. But context through event driven content - like we get in Facebook - is really interesting.
Suddenly our conversations are increasingly personal and our work relationships take on more meaning. They are communications blenders - mixing everything from what we are working on to what is going to be on our DVR that evening.
Here's the rub either way, get your communications off email. Nearly all the benefits detailed in the article apply equally to blogs and wikis as much as they apply to Twitter...