Instruments are attached to Kim's trunk which measures its growth.

It is not only Ericsson's ConnectedTree that speaks about its feelings through Twitter. Germany also has its own version named Kim, which regularly tweets the online generation finer details of its growth.

Kim, a 150-year-old oak tree in the Erlangen Botanical Gardens, northern Bavaria, has an instrument-laden black box installed by researchers at the University of Erlangen on its trunk to measure its growth and elements of its surrounding environment. Data gathered by the black box, such as the temperature or a playing squirrel, are translated into text by a server connected to a Twitter account.

Kim tweets every change it is experiencing in the hope of generating more appreciation of nature from Netizens.

"Time for production - it's photosynthesis weather!" it tweeted on Sept. 2, according to The Local.

Kim was wired in May 2010. Since then, it has gotten 14,000 "Likes" on Facebook and 4,000 followers on Twitter, blogger Serge Reuter said.

The 18-metre oak also has a blog containing in-depth stories on her life and nature-related issues. Daniel Lingenhöhl, online editorial director of the magazine "Spectrum of Science," posts on Kim's behalf.

Walter Weiß, curator of the Erlangen Botanical Garden, told The Local, "The twittering tree could become an important representative of the natural world and strengthen ties between the human online community and the environment."

In contrast, Ericsson's ConnectedTree reacts based on the activity around it. Connected to it is a device that turns the tree into an electromagnetic field sensor, enabling it to detect motion. The sensor transmits information about that movement and the changes it causes in its electromagnetic field to a processor in a nearby laptop, which then activates a number of responses and forwards the tree's reactions to Twitter and SMS.

When someone touches the ConnectedTree, for example, it sends out an SMS to a passer-by's mobile phone. Aside from tweets and SMS, the tree expresses its mood by playing music, speaking and turning a light on and off.