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It’s time to bring back Twitter Journalism. And what better time than the present?

In between jobs, tonight I spoke at the Columbia University Journalism School’s advanced social media workshop with the amazing Sree Sreenivasan (@Sree). (Don’t miss Sree’s Storify of the event here.)

TwitPics by Lydia Burdick and Gregory Galante

Steve Buttry of Gazette Communications is collecting tips on how journalists can use Twitter and real-world examples of how journalists have used Twitter in the past, both good and bad experiences.

News of Editor and Publisher shutting down made the rounds on Twitter in a hurry on Thursday. It escalated up the site’s “trending topics” as it was tweeted and retweeted hundreds of times in just minutes.

In fact, many said they first heard the news through Twitter – including Gina Chen and myself as a matter of fact. It makes sense, as journalists are following journalists, and the news spread quickly from one person to the next.

Twitter began rolling out its latest feature – “lists” – to select users this week, with plans to opening it up to everyone soon.

Earlier this month, journalism professor and mindcast-extraordinaire Jay Rosen had his followers scratching their heads when he made this prediction:

1. 
   jayrosen_nyu You’ll find out yourself soon enough, but I’m telling you now. “Lists” are going to change Twitter http://jr.ly/4jm4 04 Oct 2009 from web

The Washington Post took swift action after controversial tweets from one of its managing editors Raju Narisetti disclosed opinions on healthcare reform and the hospitalization of Sen. Robert Byrd.

Not only has Narisetti since closed his Twitter account, but the Post on Friday implemented a series of new social networking guidelines. It says the guidelines had previously been in the works, but editors “decided to accelerate the completion of [them]” after the Narisetti incident.

Because of its simplicity, Twitter has great potential for many different uses and applications. With a little creativity, the possibilities are nearly endless.

Twitter debuted a new homepage today (July 28, 2009, remember that date in history), and it shows a fundamental shift from “what are you doing?” to a new emphasis on real-time search and information distribution.

It doesn’t take much to see where news is breaking these days.

In the latest instances of a growing trend, a shooting in Washington, D.C. Wednesday, and explosions in Jakarta Friday were reported on Twitter by several accounts more than 15 minutes before traditional media reports.

Not only is mainstream media losing its edge, but the “breaking news” phenomenon in general is losing its value, according to Frédéric Filloux of Monday Note.

The other day, I took a look at how the Associated Press used Twitter to cover the Sonia Sotomayor hearings.

It was a landmark experiment for that organization, and it seems the most extensive such project, fueled by a team of eight. But live tweets during the hearings weren’t limited to the AP.