Let me get this out of the way: Twitter sucks. Don’t get me wrong, I enjoy the idea of microblogging (I’ve been using it of late to test my abilities to write poems of exactly 140 characters in length–yes, it is about as hard and stupid as it sounds) and think its a brilliant communications medium that will only explode as a) we become more comfortable as a species typing on our cellphones and b) Apple figures out a way to make it possible for us to type on our cellphones (me, an Apple bigot? Pshaw!) But Twitter, as has been reported frequently since last spring, has been plagued with outages that inspire not only vitriol, but even some thoughtful analysis.

So, considering my affinity for microblogging (remember? That was the point of this post) and my long-standing love for all things FLOSS (look it up) you can imagine my excitement (no really, excitement is the word for it) at hearing about Laconi.ca, the open microblogging solution that has all us tech geeks squee-ing in delight. Here’s the idea:

I set up the Laconi.ca software on my server.
I then let my friends access my microblog server so we can have a private network.

It’s really that simple. So, remember how I said Twitter sucks? Well, imagine a solution that allows you to microblog to your personal community without the issues of universal scalability that has threatened Twitter’s success. Okay, so it’s not anywhere near as much fun as the wide-openness of Twitter and for that reason likely won’t replace the much-maligned service.

Where it will be very useful, however, is in corporate environments. A company looking for a way to blast out short updates to its sales force could set up a Laconi.ca server, meaning they no longer have to rely on a third-party for such service. Moreover, with the current level of interoperability between Twitter and Laconi.ca (and more to come, as well as for Pownce, Jaiku, etc.) those individuals would not necessarily have to subscribe to multiple services to get all their messages.

I’m planning to play with the software in the near future. I’ll keep everyone updated with my findings. In the meantime, check out this article for a brief overview and this article for a more technical explanation of how it works.