Twitter

[cybrxkhan]

I don't use twitter. Most people I know don't use it.

I don't see how it can help me much. But I understand how it is useful to others. Or a good way to spend time. Waste time, maybe.

 

[Quintillus]

I don't get it, either. It's like Facebook, except with fewer privacy controls and without the ability to post anything lengthy. So... I don't really see the point.

FWIW, I'm in my 20s, so I don't think being 41 has a lot to do with not getting Twitter. And I've read that it actually is more popular with a somewhat older crowd than Facebook and the old MySpace. Why that is, I don't know.

It's a good way to get updates on things like games in development, patching times, that kind of stuff, as well as keeping track of stuff going on during the offseason in sports. Thanks to twitter we usually know of signings hours before we could otherwise.

But why not just read the relevant developer blogs, sign up for newsletters about things you really care about, and sports news sites? Sure, you might not find things out quite as quickly, but do you really need to?

Though I'll admit in part I'm against it just because I don't like the "SMS to the world" idea that Twitter seems to embody.

 

[Dachs]

I use Twitter chiefly to keep tabs on people I consider interesting. Many of them are sports writers, game writers, and book writers, who post links to articles, etc. Makes it easier for me to get at them; clicking refresh on an aggregator site or whatever gets old real fast. In addition, sometimes they stuff they tweet is just funny. I enjoy funny things. Maybe that's weird of me.

 

[azzaman333]

The quality of experience is almost entirely dependent on who you follow.

 

[Hygro]

It's one of the easiest ways to get the attention of people who wouldn't normally give you the time of day.

 

[downtown]

It's one of the easiest ways to get the attention of people who wouldn't normally give you the time of day.

Yup, that's another reason why it's great.

I think the sheer volume on inane crap on twitter may be even bigger than it is on facebook, (which can make finding quality content harder), but for anybody who cares about the news, it's a pretty critical tool. I think probably 80% of the people that I follow are bloggers or other journalists.

 

[Synobun]

But why not just read the relevant developer blogs, sign up for newsletters about things you really care about, and sports news sites? Sure, you might not find things out quite as quickly, but do you really need to?

I see no reasonable reason to opt to going to 5+ different websites and scrolling through all the junk when you can go to 1 site, scroll down, and see everything and be linked to everything you find of interest directly.

 

[BirraImperial]

What's so wrong about Twitter? You follow the people that you like, if you don't want to be bothered by anyone, just make your account private and only your followers will be able to see your tweets. The experience is tailored to whatever you like. Facebook OTOH, is starting to annoy me.

 

[madviking]

yea facebook is quickly falling out of favor with me too.

 

[Zelig]

I see no reasonable reason to opt to going to 5+ different websites and scrolling through all the junk when you can go to 1 site, scroll down, and see everything and be linked to everything you find of interest directly.

Well that's what feedly is for.

Seriously, feedly (or comparable alternative) with associated apps for any mobile devices you own is awesome. I never visit any news site. (Well, I avoid anything except science and technology news anyway, but I never have to visit any of those sites, entire articles are all delivered through feedly, ad-free, synced between my work computer/desktop/laptop/tablet/phone.)

 

[Birdjaguar]

"A sickness upon the earth."

I have an account, but don't use it.

 

[Smellincoffee]

Although I sign in perhaps once every two months, I follow for news, blog updates, and few novelty accounts.

 

[bhsup]

I see no reason to sign up for a twitter account, nor do I know a single person off-line that actually uses it. It seems like a gimmicky service for celebrities, journalists, politicians, and companies to announce new stories, products, events, or stuff like that.

This. What irritates me is when companies that I -am- interested in keeping up on insist on making announcements via facebook or twitter instead of their main company website. I have no desire to use these worthless portals.

 

[Leoreth]

Even though I have an account, I don't use it actively or passively. And I'm also a great deal younger than peter, so that's definitely not it.

I also wouldn't say it's a social network in the sense that Facebook is. At least I've never heard of anyone using Twitter to organize their social lives or keep in touch with friends and so on. As others have said, I think the main use of it seems to be to passively follow people you like or want to be informed about, and I can't see anything wrong with that. Twitter is certainly the website that serves this purpose best, so I think it's here to stay.

Really the only thing that annoys me about Twitter is how the mainstream news media, especially TV news, are obsessed with it. Don't they realize that reading tweets out loud on their air time is the same as broadcasting the opinions of a couple of random people they found in the local pub last night? It's not surprising that they're a dying form of media.

 

[Borachio]

I don't use it. But perhaps I should. The character limit really appeals to me.

 

[Birdjaguar]

140 characters is pretty short and line breaks are not retained, so it is not good for humorous verses.

 

[Terxpahseyton]

I'm only 41 but I get seriously luddity when I hear media-vores gush about Twitter.

I am (to echo Quintillus) in my 20s and I hear you. One of our public channels likes to be a bit hip and references Twitter frequently, to my annoyance. One of the main issues of the public discourse is superficiality / lack of nuance. Catering to twitter to me seems and feels like a total lack of awareness of this issue but instead embracing this problem with open arms so that the channel my seem "adaptive" or "innovative". Stupid.

(edit: @Leoreth just read your post now. Are you also thinking of ZDF?)

Despite of this phenomena, Twitter actually does extraordinarily weak in Germany. No comparison to its popularity in the US, but as I recall also other Western populations are much more willing to join Twitter than the German one. This is one of those moments where I am a bit proud of my fellow countrymen and -women.

There seems to be this idea that twitter itself is stupid, rather than certain people who use it.

Twitter is designed for very short messages and a high frequency of such messages.
I believe I get what you are saying. Twitter can be very valuable. I don't want to stigmatize every follower or twitterer. But surely you can see that this basic design of Twitter has certain implications related to stupidity?

 

[Leoreth]

(edit: @Leoreth just read your post now. Are you also thinking of ZDF?)

I was mainly thinking of CNN, but I get what you mean. The ZDF has an inconsistent track record there imo. Many of its shows also have the crappy "let's read random tweets" segment, but especially their sister channel ZDF info sometimes tries to be a bit smarter than that, incorporating social media into their program as a way to participate in discussions or ask questions.

It's not the revolution of TV, but at least its a legitimate use of the medium and generally I always appreciate attempts to include the audience. I'm more opposed to the superficial "look we have Twitter are we cool again" mindset.

 

[Arwon]

There seems to be this idea that twitter itself is stupid, rather than certain people who use it.

Which is hilariously ironic because it's 100% self-curated so if you're getting dumb it's your own fault.

I am a frequent user, username is Arwon, like here. I average somewhere on the order of 25 tweets a day so about 50k total.

It's gotten to the stage where I get pretty much all my politics and sports news from it. There is something that could loosely be described as a Canberra/Australian political twittersphere, that tends to throw up what's important to me and keep me informed.

It also occasionally causes drinks to happen. A few friends of mine actually originated as twitterfolk.

I also run a parody Twitter account ( www.twitter.com/wattsdointhings ) that could charitably be described as "absurdly niche."

 

[illram]

It's the last online "thing" I have not done. Sort of the last vestige of my ancient pre-internet self. I share Peter's questions but I think I get what it is... I just don't want it.

Like everything else I will probably eventually succumb.