A Philosophical Approach To Twitter
Most my friends back home haven’t even heard of Twitter! Which makes me think that it is still rising in popularity. I tell them that people are using it to network with people involved in similar interest, broadcast their opinions, and text each other for free…
Like many people I’m sure, when I began Tweeting it felt like I was in my personal version of hell… listening to hundreds of other people’s inner monologues was a bit daunting. Even though I find myself taking extended breaks in between updates, I’m more optimistic now and drawing from my experience I will defend Twitter as a useful tool.
Commercialism is everywhere. Awareness that this was happening with Twitter became clearer week by week. When I started seeing advertisements in my GMail declaring, “Twitter Is Commercial!!!” It was confirmed. While companies were trying to make money by gaining followers on Twitter, others were trying to make money by calling them out on it. When that happens, you know things are getting bad.
Either way both sides are only as effective as we let them be, because Twitter is an excellent example of what makes the internet so powerful… the user holds all the keys. As John Audette put it once after a hard days work, the history of human evolution has stressed great importance on the index finger. It pulled the trigger when it was more common that making a decision often meant killing a man. Now often times, the powerful decisions are made by using it to click a mouse.
Advertisements are only as obtrusive as we let them be (minus those full screen advertisements with no close button that every once in awhile makes it past the pop-up blockers…)
Own It
Use you’re Twitter homepage space like you own it!… cause you do, it’s your real estate. You control what you end up reading so make it worth your while. If you don’t like commercial tweets, click on their profile picture, confirm their intentions, and stop following them.
Personally, I don’t follow people who fill up my entire page with @replies & random insider tweets. The best advise I read as a newb, which helped me understand what Twitter was all about, was written by Sam Swenson… here are his examples of bad (incomplete) vs. good (complete) tweets:
Bad Tweets
“@soandso congratulations!”
“@soandso where is that happening?”
“@soandso no, it was cheese … who knew!”
“@soandso that’s great news. Wear a foil cap!”
Good Tweets
“@soandso you bought a gorilla? congratulations!”
“@soandso you have a rash? where is that happening?”
“@soandso I watched the debates. I was hoping for some really good depth to their answers. But no, it was cheese … who knew!”
“@soandso you’re moving to Roswell, New Mexico? That’s great news. Wear a foil cap!”
Twitter Search
Quite possibly the best thing Twitter has to offer, is the ability to function as a real time forum. You ask questions and immediately get answers. To make the best of this use Twitter Search to surround yourself with people who share you’re interests and who seem to be knowledgeable. (Tip: use quotation marks around words you want together, example… to find people who also thinks windows sucks type… “windows sucks”.)
When you have an interest in something you’re vocabulary (jargon), starts to become more complex. Use those words to find people who might be on the same level as you. For Example… Right now… if I searched:
-”Gmail SMS” I would get tweets of the people who are on top of the developments of the email that I use. From there I can weed out the commercial updates and focus on finding/following more intelligent/useful users
-”RememberTheMilk” Would point me to some people who use the same task management app.
Now if I ever have any questions, there’s a good chance I can save time by using Twitter to get immediate and useful answers.
