Twitter is back

Tweets were silenced for about two hours early today, as the popular microblog site, Twitter.com was the target of a denial-of-service attack. That meant users were unable to send their maximum 140-character messages, known as ìtweets,î until service was restored. My Twitter home page showed no activity from those I ìfollowî for several hours.

Interestingly, I am having no trouble with Twitter.com on my computer, but I am encountering "network errors" on my BlackBerry. No updates there since yesterday. Hmmmm ...

One of those I follow uses Twitter extensively throughout the day is Peter Shankman, whose Twitter handle is @skydiver. Shankman is the founder of Help A Reporter Out (HARO), a service that connects reporters with sources via Twitter. Today happens to be his birthday, and his first tweet following the blackout was ìI don't think I've ever been more scared in my life.î

Sign up to follow @skydiver today, as Shankman is giving away an HP Netbook to his 50,000th follower. At last look, he is still about 735 shy.

Good luck!