Last night Dazed&Confused conducted an interview with members of the band The Gossip but with a crucial twist – the mag and both interviewees conversed using Twitter.

Questions sent to @dazedmagazine were retweeted so all followers and both interviewees (using @thegossipband) could see them.

Journalism.co.uk asked D&C’s Alistair Allen, digital director, and Dazed Digital’s Tara O’Shea why and how it was done.

How has D&C used Twitter previously? how has it built up its following?
[AA]We just use it like Dazed has it’s own personality, which it does in a way; we ask questions and get feedback from real people which is really useful.

We also have a ‘Tweet this’ button on our site which is regularly used to spread DazedDigital articles, but generally most of our growth is organic, people discovering the Dazed Twitter through friends.

Will the interview feed into a magazine/web piece?
[AA]The interview will be archived on our site DazedDigital.com, with links to the original people who asked the questions.

Why use Twitter and not a different tool?
[TOS]We choose twitter as we are really keen on it and thought it would be an interesting concept, one that has not been done before. I think we are deciding to call them twinterviews and I’ve already got more ideas for more twinterviews with people, I’m just trying to iron out some of the problems we had.

Were the Gossip chosen for this interview because they are keen on Twitter?
[TOS]The Gossip were chosen as they are on the front cover of our new issue. Nathan from The Gossip is also keen on technology and wanted to get involved with twitter when we mentioned it.

Any problems?
[TOS]The only problem was that sometimes it was a bit confusing matching the questions to the answers, but we are figuring this out.

Journalism.co.uk has tried its own Twinterviews before and threading questions and answers together has been tricky. Any suggestions for a way around this? Or indeed what are your thoughts on interviewing via Twitter?