Paul Smith is a guy from Newscastle, UK. He blogs for the Guardian newspaper and recently decided to hitchhike as far as possible around the world by relying on the help of Twitter users. Part publicity stunt, this is an endeavor to raise money for charity:water, a nonprofit that brings clean/safe drinking water to developing nations.

The aim is to travel as far from home (Newcastle upon Tyne, UK) as possible within 30 days. New Zealand is the place closest to the opposite point on the planet to my house, so that should be my intended destination.

I may spend two days sat in Newcastle’s Central Station before catching the bus home, but I’m hoping that Twitterers will offer me a car ride up or down the road, a bed or sofa for the night; hopefully somebody can help me onto a standby flight or the likes of Eurostar, or maybe they’ll have a ferry ticket they can’t use.

One of the main rules he has set for himself is to only accept offers of travel and accomodation from Twitter users following his Twitter account (@twitchhiker) and no-one else. It’s kinda like couch surfing, but only within the Twitter network.

This is a pretty smart way to leverage the Twitter network and generate some buzz for an external cause (charity) and something that nonprofits or other businesses can pay heed to. @twitchhiker is already getting 100s of new followers in an hour as the link is spread throughout Twitter. The idea itself is fiendishly attractive, especially to Twitterers who wouldn’t mind helping a fellow user to do something exciting they could be doing themselves (travelling the world).

It will be interesting to see how this pans out, I’m pretty sure the Twitter network is strong and large enough to move Paul hundreds (maybe thousands) of miles from his starting point.

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More articles about Twitter:

  1. Freestyle Travelling: Using Twitter as a Tourist Tool
  2. Twestival: A Gathering of Twitter Communities for Charity
  3. Tweepular: Easy Way to Manage Your Twitter Followers
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  5. TwitterFriends Helps You Rediscover Your Twitter Network

Filed under: How People Use Twitter