Maybe this is Goodbye
Here's something that may surprise you: I've been thinking about shutting down my twitter account. I've been looking at it a number of different ways. I could go on hiatus from my account, delete the account, or start a new anonymous account following new people.
It's no secret that I am anti-hashtag and that has always been something that aggravates me about twitter. It's also not a secret that I was repelled by AMC's agency's use of Twitter to fanjack and promote the TV show "Mad Men." What's been eating at me lately in twitter is the echochamber. The same social media voices tweeting the same social media cliches. People interested in building "personal brands" rather than just being people. Evangelists who petulantly bang their fists that clients should stop demanding metrics for social media because conversation can't be measured. Really? Conversation can't be measured? Then make it measurable. Attach an action or metric. Setting goals and defining success are part of our jobs, regardless of those who think social media is about winning a Facebook or Twitter popularity contest or gathering the shiniest collection of widgets and gadgets.
Maybe this is part of a Phillies malaise, but it is something that's been on my mind for some time now. I just want a community where people communicate like real people to other people and not as "experts" or "authorities" or as "knowledge centers" doing their personal note-taking using a # sign and an abbrevation. I just want twitter to be what it used to be when I joined in February 2007: a place where I meet people near and far, learn what they are doing/thinking, find or lend support, and sometimes, just a place to escape - like that rabbit hole into Wonderland.
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Philly-based marketing professional. An insane music fan. Intolerable knowledge of pop culture. Admitted over-tweeter.
I'm Annie Heckenberger. I like music. I'm an overtweeter. I lead Social Media & PR at Red Tettemer in Philadelphia, PA.Learn more...
10 comments:
i think you just need to purge who you follow. the great thing about twitter is you can bend and meld the conversation as you see fit. following and unfollowing at will.
One's twitter network is what one makes of it.
If you want to have an account that mirrors your closer connections, then perhaps start a new account, but limit your adds to contacts in your personal email account.
The other thing that I do, is I use the lists in friendfeed to filter our my "friends" from random people on twitter, as a way of reducing the amount of info.
I feel that twitter loses some of it's usability after you follow more than 50 people. Too much white noise.
Don't leave. I am a real person. Just an uncool mom trying to be cool and have fun chatting from my though bubble thru tweets with others like you. Don't go...
I also enjoy engaging with the Mad Men ppl. I don't see that as shameless advertising. Just another dimension of entertainment at least for me. I don't get out much.
AC
Life of a Juggernaut
crazyjugs.blogspot.com
So then pick and choose who you follow and boot out the personal branders and note-takers! Create the community of people that you want!
In the interest of full disclosure, I love the AMC Mad Men twitterers - I think they're a darling way to hold my interest between episodes of the show. In fact, I think it's a genius marketing move on their part - realtime enhancements to a show that I'm already watching. If you're not already watching Mad Men, why would you ever follow them?
Leaving twitter to spite the social media echochamber is a mistake - there are people, near and far, who enjoy conversing with you in a real time, character limited format. I recently unlocked my account for 2 hours and was repelled by the number of people following me - who cares what I'm doing with my dog? who cares that I'm having a beer with friends? If you want to know where I am to measure success in marketing to my demographic, my brightkite lends more than enough information and is publicly available. It even feeds to my twitter so the people I choose to let follow me don't have to check it on their own.
Twitter needs more people like you, who have real conversations about real things. Standing in the face of soulless marketing gives us more options about who we follow - removing yourself entirely leaves us with a bunch of spoolbots and cliches.
I, for one, would miss you.
- @babyk
Taking it back old school with a blog comment. (At the risk of unknowingly spouting one of those cliches...)I think of twitter as a dinner party, not a single conversation. At a dinner party, you mingle. Move on to the next conversation when you get bored or someone takes over the one you're engaged in. I read the 95 theses and the Cluetrain manifesto when you suggested them awhile back, and I thought they represented a little too wistful an embrace of technology, that it would somehow make us all more real to each other. But there's nothing about twitter or any other social networking tool that inherently gets at some essential humanity. It's a personal ethic you have to subscribe to, and it transcends all of the various media through which we communicate to one another. It'd be a shame if you left twitter. I think we'd all be better off if you just refreshed your drink, powdered your nose, and found a new conversation across the party. F'reals.
Amen. It's getting markedly more difficult to filter out and keep away from all of the puffery and hashtags. The recent series of attempts to use hashtags as interfaces for things outside of Twitter is something of a hijack. We're all forced to go along for the ride.
I just want to talk and listen, human-style. I don't want all the extraneous meta-garbage. Maybe it's time to prune the follow list way down again.
That is sooo Money!!I whole heartedly concur!! I went to DM you as a fellow Philly Fan who was at the park last night and much of the frenzy that followed..AMAZING ENERGY! But I saw that you were not yet following me @NamasteMan So follow me and let's bring the conversation back into the twitter verse. DM me when ya get this my fellow Phillie Philly...
GO Phillies!!!
G
I agree with many points put out here, especially the one about missing you if you leave. I have unfollowed many "auto tweeters" If I see that "Brilliant blah blah Blissfully Domestic" again I may scream (psst don't tell, I contribute), but I have unfollowed those. I see it as a place to put my thoughts that aren't big enough for a blog. ANd to root for my DODGERS!
purge the follow list! i like twitter because of who i follow, i don't "follow-back" just because people follow me doesn't mean they're interesting to be followed
if that fails then maybe give up...
but there are still people being people out there
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