I had lunch with one of the very savvy people I know last week.
I was surprised, as I am often, when he complained that he has trouble following the twitter feeds of people that have lots of @-replies in their tweets; that is, tweets addressed to other tweeps, using the convention of starting with @[username] at the beginning of the tweet.
He wasn't specifically addressing his complaint to me, but it is something I know I am "guilty" of.
It's true, @-replies can be annoying. They can disrupt the flow of an otherwise entertaining and informative Twitter stream filled with pithy observations and links.
People have told me that they feel compelled to try to dig down and read the entire conversation, either traveling from one "in reply to" link to another, or by using a service like Tweetree.
In fact, another friend of mine, Lynda Partner, had a post recently in which she gripes about the tweeps that have too many replies in their tweets. She calls them the "socialites" and says: "you gotta wonder why anyone wants to follow one side of a bunch of conversations even if it’s with a celebrity - it smacks of teenage girl talk."
The thing is, you don't need to follow these conversations. You are in no way obligated to. Twitter provides a settings menu (go to the notices tab) where you can choose which replies you will see. (Here is a Twitter help article explaining this.)
That's right. You choose what you see. If you are seeing @-replies you don't care for, then you should probably change your settings.
For instance, I have it set so that I see only the @-replies of people I follow when I am also following the person the reply was directed to. So, if @lpartner replies to @tcoopee or @robertlendvai, I will see it, because I (very happily) follow them too. I won't see it when she replies to @steveadolph (unless I go directly to Lynda's twitter profile to read all her tweets, or if I do a search and it turns up).
Folks - there is no right or wrong way to use Twitter. Some people use it as a social platform, a sort of Facebook Lite, an open networking tool (which probably describes me). Others use it to pontificate or to market their products, to narrowcast or broadcast their feeds. Some people use it to tell you what they had for breakfast.
None of these people is wrong. I follow people of most types, for a variety of reasons.
Who do you follow?
