Is Twitter the new Facebook?

Created in 2006 by Jack Dorsey, Biz Stone and Evan Williams as a research tool for a podcasting company, Twitter is an online phenomenon. Basically, you sign on, post a silly photo, and ask the site to find your friends by rifling through your email address book. Then you start posting text-message-sized "tweets" (maximum 160 characters) which can be read on-site by anyone.

This brevity breeds banality but Twitter's audience reportedly doubled to 1.05 million between October 2007 and May 2008, and it hit the news more recently by carrying more immediate - often inaccurate - information on the Mumbai crisis than the mainstream media.

The real gimmick, though, is that you can "follow" anyone who has not limited the access to their feed, and there is the chance - gasp! - of getting messages from celebrity users as well as friends.

But let's look at those celebrities, shall we? Barack Obama is on there (politician trying to appear "with-it"). So is Britney Spears (imploded starlet trying to jump-start career) and Stephen Fry - though he's an avowed and unashamed geek.

In the name of journalistic rigour, reluctantly I log on. Twitter tells me it can't read the address book on my work email or my personal account -effectively telling me I have no mates. It says it can't send updates to my phone, but not why. I manage to post an update - "trying to work out what to do on this effing site" - but since Twitter doesn't recognise any of my friends, I can't invite anyone to read it and "follow" me. (I'm aware I sound like Ned Ludd's grandfather, but a twentysomething techno-whizz colleague fared no better.) Still, clicking on a button ominously marked "Everyone" leads me to the latest feeds.

Many posts are in languages neither I nor my computer can read, but finally, after several false starts ("Error on page!") I manage to log on to MoodyShell's feed. "I hate it when I burn the roof of my mouth and then it starts to peel. Ew!" she says. Fascinating. Another click, and I am officially "following" her. It feels queasy and wrong.

I can't find any celebrities, or any breaking news, just endless prattle from people with too much time and too little imagination. After two hours, I log out, and I won't be back. Britney, Barack: if you want to get in touch, you'd better phone me. But only if you've got something worthwhile to say.