There are two types of people in this world: those who think that Twitter is fantastic, and those who despise it or just simply don't care. I used to be the latter. Twitter seemed like an intrusive bother, something on which other people, who don't have anything better to do, spend their time. So, when we decided to enlarge our scope through "social networking", I was less than enthusiastic. PI's president, Kate Branham, had the insight to suggest we turn this over to Michelle Jacobs.

To my amazement, I find the "tweets" that Michelle sends out to be the single greatest source for keeping up with the field of wrongful convictions. For a guy who hardly finds time to read a newspaper (not something I'm proud of!), PI's tweets are just right! It is as if I hired someone to search the news and daily bring to my attention the articles worth reading (usually one a day). And when I say "bring to my attention", I mean that I don't have to remember to check it. Text messages appear on cell phones in a non-obnoxious way. This is not a superficial approach just because they are delivered via Twitter. The articles Michelle links to give in depth information on the subject. Not only does Michelle narrow down the field for us, but when I receive a "tweet", I see what amounts to a headline, giving me enough information to determine if I'm interested in reading the in-dept article.

If you are already familiar with Twitter, PI's twitter name is "provnginnocence" (Notice the 'i' is missing in "proving". Or just click on the Twitter button in this newsletter.) The rest of this article is about 1) how to set up a Twitter account and 2) how to make the tweets become a text message to your smart phone. I find this second part is what makes this so simple and convenient. So even if you are familiar with Twitter, part 2 may be of interest. This is written for those with little knowledge about these kind of things. There are lots of things people use Twitter for, including tweeting about their every thought! This article will focus exclusively on receiving tweet text messages from PI that link to in-depth articles.

On a computer or tablet, go to www.twitter.com and "sign up". You might give some thought to a name for yourself before you do this. There can be no spaces and you are limited to 15 characters. (That's why we dropped the 'i' in "provnginnocence".) You can be clever or just come up with a name that everyone you know will recognize as you. The easiest approach is to type in your name with a space and below it Twitter will suggest a name without a space that is unique to the twitter system.

After clicking "Create an Account", you will be taken to your main page, the first step of a wizard to help you set up. There are many options, but I'm going to keep this focused on getting news from Proving Innocence. In this step of the wizard, there doesn't appear to be a place to search for "provnginnocence", so at this point you can just select one person/group to "follow" as a place-holder so you can move on in the wizard. Later you can go back and add provnginnocence and take the other out. Don't forget to look in your email for a message from Twitter, and if you don't see it, check your spam or junk folders. You must respond to it or your registration will not be complete.

Somewhere along the way, you will come across directions for downloading Twitter onto your phone. From what I can tell, this may add a lot of features to your phone, but it is not necessary to receive these Twitter text messages, so we will go into that.

Once your account is established, when you first log in, you will see something like this:


On the upper menu, click on "Who To Follow". (Not "Following" or "Followers".) This will give you a screen like the following:



Now, directly across from the page title 'Who To Follow', type in the search field "provnginnocence" (no quotes and no i!). Note: searching in the search box at the top will yield varied results and generally is not helpful for this.

After entering 'provnginnocence' and hitting <return>, this should come up. In the left column, find the Proving Innocece description and select the Follow button. It will change to "Following".

Congratulations! You are now "following" Proving Innocence on Twitter!

Selecting which of the people or groups you follow that you also want to send you a text message is an additional step, so if you want to follow others, go right ahead.

This second part is comprised on two steps: 1) Setting your account up to be able to send text messages to your phone, and 2) then selecting which people or groups you follow that you also want to send you a text message.



1) From any page view, at the top-right, click on the down arrow next to your account name, and then select Settings.

On the next page, click on the 'Mobile' tab and follow the directions for connecting your Twitter account to your cell phone.



Once that is completed, go back to the Home page (top menu in black) and in the right column, click on "Following", as highlighted in yellow.



Now all the people and groups you are following show up on the left. Click on provnginnocence. When you do, options for provnginnocence will show up on the right.



One of those options is a small icon that looks like a phone, which I have highlighted in yellow. When you hover your mouse pointer over it, it will say, "Tweets from this user are not sent to your phone."

Click on it. It will turn green and when you hover over it, it will now say, "Tweets from this user are sent to your phone."

Now, you will receive text message notices from your twitter account every time ProvngInnocence sends out a tweet! If you have any feedback or would like to tell us about something you think should be tweeted, please let Michelle know!  Send email to Michelle.