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Rant on Twitter before breakfast

/rant

I’m gonna jump on the bandwagon and finally do a “Twitter rant” post.  But it isn’t gonna go the way you  expect.

Do a blog search for “Twitter” lately and your browser will be lit up with all the latest rants about the service’s failings.  Granted, Twitter hasn’t had the best track record to say the very least.  And their ‘leadership’ gave dubious meaning to the word.  And they schedule maintenance at suspicious times.  And they didn’t seem to care about their users.  And they underestimated the popularity of their little bit of code.  And they run experiments that wipe away followers and followees for a day or two.  And they weren’t enforcing their terms of service. And they annoy developers by locking down their API.  And… And… And…

ANNNNND: I’m growing tired of all the winge!  People need to get a clue.  Twitter still wails on any other copycat service.  Twitter is THE microblogging giant.  They are improving.  They are communicating more on their blog, acquiring supportive services like Summize.  I had a swift response by @Jack to a complaint about a griefer user.  My followee numbers are back to normal.  They are making good faith efforts.

I’m not sure what people want from Twitter.  Maybe they are just the giant we love to hate, like the rest of the world loves to hate The States.  Who knows?  But if I hear ONE MORE EGOTISTICAL SOCIAL MEDIA WHORE whine about losing followers, I’m gonna go BOOYAH on somebody’s ass. Cyndy Aleo-Carreira has it right over on Louis Gray’s site, it’s just plain old HUBRIS that drives people to mourn and moan the absence of their ‘adoring masses.’

IT’S JUST AN APP, people.  For fun and maybe a place to share some good recipes.  YOU ARE NOT FAMOUS.  GET OVER YOURSELF.  TWITTER IS FREE.  And with Twitter, you are definitely getting more than what you pay for it in time and energy.  If I were the Twitter guys, I’d be a bit disgusted by this show of the worst the social media crowd has to offer.

/rant

Comments on this entry are closed.

  • Rick Wolff 25 July 2008, 8:24 am

    Thank you! Or should I say, THANK YOU! The temptation is strong to recall for all these whippersnappers the days before all this social media stuff.

    • PurpleCar 25 July 2008, 8:53 am

      Thanks guys! I try to avoid ranting and YELLING, but this is ridiculous.

      I’m not sure there were any internet days that weren’t like this. I’ve been driving around da interwebz for 20 years and I have to say, not much has changed. There is just more of it. This is a good and a bad thing.

  • Mark Dykeman 25 July 2008, 8:34 am

    I like your perspective, little red corvette.

  • Sarah Curtis 25 July 2008, 9:08 am

    That was just great. I didn’t get the whining and was truly turned of by it in many ways and I didn’t even check blog posts just tweets, plurks, dents etc.

    • PurpleCar 26 July 2008, 9:17 pm

      Thanks Sarah and Pai! Hate to be negative, ya know? But I’m truly embarrassed by all of this. Makes me want to steer people away from Twitter and social media in general.

  • Paisano® 25 July 2008, 10:23 am

    You go, girl! Well said. I’m sick of the whining too. Especially from the egomaniacs who never take the time to follow anyone back and use twitter as a one way mirror of vanity. Whatevah.
    I did a post like this a while ago when it started to become a trend to rip twitter.
    http://thepaisano.com/stop-flipping-the-bird/

    Good stuff.

    Pai

  • willyfoureyes 20 August 2008, 5:18 pm

    Yeah…I don’t understand why there’s so much complaining about it. I know I’ve been tempted to piss and moan about Twitter because it’s the “next big thing” (a la MySpace and Facebook), but like most others, I learn to adapt. I should probably communicate more with the people I’m following, but it doesn’t always work both ways, you know?

    • PurpleCar 21 August 2008, 6:01 pm

      Will-

      thanks for coming.

      Yeah, we all love to complain. It’s a sport. And yes, you can’t really communicate with people who 1. don’t follow back and 2. don’t answer your @’s or DM’s. Some people are Twitter snobs, just as they are in real life, so just ditch ’em. I’m not treating Twitter as a personality contest. I unfollow even the ‘famous’ social media people if they make too much noise, ya know? It doesn’t matter. I just try to have fun with it.

      -PC