Social media trends and LDS general conference

Mormons tweeters tend to disappear during the six-month span between conferences. Skaggs encourages them to keep with it. For those who want to participate, friend and follow people who are already doing it until you feel more comfortable. If someone posts something worthwhile, “don’t just look and enjoy it; share and encourage your friends to do the same,” she said.

President Uchtdorf encouraged members, especially youths, to “use their hands” with technology to spread the gospel. Skaggs knows she isn’t of the younger generation but plans to keep tweeting the gospel message regardless. She was thrilled with President Uchtdorf’s message.

“Perhaps the Lord’s encouragement to ‘open our mouths’ might today include ‘use your hands’ to blog and text message the gospel to the world,” President Uchtdorf said.

“Brothers and sisters, with the blessings of modern technology, we can express gratitude and joy about God’s great plan for his children in a way that can be heard not only around our workplace but around the world. Sometimes a single phrase of testimony can set events in motion that affect someone’s life for eternity.”

It used to take several weeks for the church to make general conference materials ready. Now, with a small army of translators and interpreters, editors, graphic artists, web experts and audio/video specialists, it happens much faster.

Text will be available in English by the end of the week, while other languages will be ready in two to eight weeks. The Ensign and Liahona magazines will be published in four to six weeks.

Video and audio versions of the talks are already available on LDS.org in several languages. DVDs, however, will not be ready for six weeks.

For more details on the availability of general conference addresses, visit LDS.org.

Contributing: Logan Dunn

Email: ttoone@desnews.com