I recently re-read "Letting down the ponytail," one of the first posts I wrote about being @SookieBonTemps on Twitter. Well, it's been about three months since I wrote that piece, and about five months since I assumed the persona of Sookie Stackhouse.
The Bon Temps Twitterverse has grown significantly. By my last count we have almost 30 characters from the Sookie Stackhouse Mysteries
/
True Blood world. That number does not include all of the original characters and real life people who've assumed RP-personalities in Bon Temps and Shreveport. Nor does it include all of the inanimate objects that have taken on a life of their own. If you've ever wanted to play with Mr. Happy, you can tweet
@EricsPlenty, you can try and make
@MerlottesTShirt wet, or you can play
@ComptonPiano.
While the Bon Temps Twitterverse has undergone a population explosion of epic proportions, I still get questions from curious people wondering just what it is we do here. Is it RP? Is it some kind of fanfic?
Both answers are true to some degree, but in my mind, this really is collaborative storytelling. Collaborative stories are unscripted, mostly unplotted storylines that come to life in the real time exchanges of multiple characters thanks to the immediacy of Twitter.
The immediacy of Twitter's format can sometimes birth a beautiful storyline supported by wonderful character dialogue. There are times when the storyline can take on odd twists -- since all of the players are ad-libbing it's possible to miss or misinterpret something that was said on the tweetstream. And finally, there are times where the tweets simply serve as character maintenance. Like real people on Twitter, we have to tweet the mundane, everyday events in our lives: Sam has to go to Monroe to pick up the drink delivery, Eric has the mundane task of reviewing Fangtasia financials, I occasionally have the pleasure of dinner with Pappy.
Regardless, the success of a collaborative story depends on the ability of the writers behind the characters to converse and bring just enough detail into 140-characters so that everyday life in the Bon Temps Twitterverse keeps the spirit of Charlaine Harris' world.
What do you think? Is this just RP? Is it just a new way of bringing fanfic to life? What's similar? What's different? I'm dying to hear your thoughts.
