My start-up is growing and I am thinking about designing a CRM/Contact space for my 250+ customers. I’m also hoping to design an overarching Twitter application to manage posts, etc. What are your thoughts on using custom software (Active MQ or Rabbit MQ) as the messaging infrastructure, vs MQ Series/IBM software? Any advice would be greatly appreciated!

-Shawna

What about MQ Light? That way if your system grows and needs stability and performance in the future, more than you get from something free, you always have the knowledge that you can move over to IBM MQ without having to change the apps.

Sounds like a fun project!  I use MQTT to bridge between home automation and Twitter.  As with Morag's suggestion, it also provides a path to IBM MQ should the need arise.  In the meantime, there are lots of public MQTT servers and packages to run it inside a SOHO NAS drive or network router.  You may also want to check with http://ifttt.com to do if/then/else logic based on events, tweets, dates and times, and so forth.