Yesterday we reported about the arrival of Rupert Murdoch on Twitter, the ‘scandal’ that’s been caused by some of the messages he’s been sending on the network, and the accidental verification of a Twitter profile that pretended to be Murdoch’s wife, Wendi, but actually turned out to be a hoax.

Egg on Twitter’s face. Even worse, a rather disparaging tweet that Murdoch wrote about Britons that he was immediately pressured into removing hasn’t been deleted it all – it’s still there, in public, and everyone can read it.

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New Career Opportunities Daily: The best jobs in media.

At first I assumed it was an issue with my computer, but after doing a little digging on Twitter I discovered it was far from an isolated incident.

Thankfully, it’s a very simple fix.

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Why? Because when people visit your profile and click on your avatar, they expect to see something larger appear. That’s the way the internet works – images are scaled down to fit into a given space, but if they’re clickable we expect them to get bigger. While Twitter automatically scales down your avatar to a 48×48 thumbnail for people’s streams, your profile image scales up to 128×128, and when you click on that you instinctively expect it to get even bigger, because there’s been a progression there.

This used to be what happened. But now, all of a sudden, when you click on an on avatar on a typical profile page the image doesn’t get bigger it all. It gets smaller. And it all looks a bit daft.

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New Career Opportunities Daily: The best jobs in media.

Today that number is likely to be a lot lower, thanks to a registration error that is preventing new users from being able to authenticate their profiles.

And as you might imagine: they’re not happy about it.

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New Career Opportunities Daily: The best jobs in media.

New Career Opportunities Daily: The best jobs in media.

I’m a pro subscriber, which means I’m actually paying to tweet. That’s fine – for me, and my team at work, HootSuite is totally indispensable.

At least, for now. In this crazy, app-filled world, nothing is forever, and no product can ever hope to buy permanent loyalty. You have to keep pushing forward and over-achieving, because things can change real fast.

In my opinion, HootSuite is currently the closest thing we have to the perfect Twitter client, but that doesn’t mean it is perfect. There are a few niggles that have always bothered me. One of these is after long periods of activity and tweets the software can get bogged down and sluggish. The other is how when you block a user their tweets are meant to instantly be removed from your timeline (you know, like on Twitter.com), but HootSuite keeps them for an indefinite period – sometimes days. That sucks – nobody wants to look at ugly for that long.

Thankfully, I’ve discovered a way to eliminate both of these problems in just a couple of clicks. It’s no big secret, but it was news to me – HootSuite has an inbuilt cache which you can clear any time you like. It works like your normal browser cache, and here’s how to do it.

1. Open HootSuite
2. Click on the Settings icon (cog), and then Preferences.
3. Click on ‘Clear Cached Messages’

I know, I know – it couldn’t be an easier or more obvious. But, but… I’m pretty sure that this is a new feature to HootSuite as I’ve never noticed it before. Or maybe I’m the Bruce Willis character in this particular iteration of The Sixth Sense, and the last person to know.

But hey – who cares, right? I got what I wanted. And now, in one fell swoop anyone can use that button to clear all the crap that HootSuite has been building up in the background. Plus, it will also remove any lingering tweets from users you’ve long-since blocked. The latter alone is worth the price of admission.

Sure, it would be nice if this could be automated in some way, and maybe that’s just around the corner. Because as I said, HootSuite has to keep striving forward. Especially when they’re asking for our credit card.

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While not every brand is in a position to manage their own tweets (and even then anyone can make a mistake), if you take your eyes off of the wheel, even for a second, you can undo months of great work. Twitter is so fast that no matter how rapidly you delete your mistake, somebody always notices, somebody always retweets, and somebody always makes sure that your mistake doesn’t go unpunished and hits the desired amount of eyeballs. And the really unlucky part is you can almost guarantee that your apology won’t reach anywhere near as many people.

Be careful out there, because while Twitter is fantastic for damage control, it’s no slouch at causing damage, either, at a pace (matched only by the reaction) that is scary quick. Even at 140 characters – or less.

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Sullivan is moderating the piece and has been live-tweeting Harvey’s comments, which are interesting, provocative and, in a few cases, more than a little controversial.

Some of Delbius’s tips are well-known and even obvious, but others are definitely new statements being made by Twitter, and there are items here that require further debate and investigation.

Don’t Be A Twitter Spammer

1. Twitter doesn’t try to judge content but if it observes a given user being blocked repeatedly, the spam team may step in to investigate further
2. Avoid using multiple accounts to send the exact same message
3. Don’t spam hashtags
4. Don’t use misleading links
5. Avoid reply spam
6. Don’t churn – manually or especially through the use of apps
7. While automated DMs aren’t expressly forbidden, Twitter recommends avoiding them because they’re unpopular and lead to complaints, which results in Twitter stepping in
8. Sponsored tweets must be disclosed by US law
9. If you’ve been unfairly tagged as a spammer, ask for help. (“I’m super into forgiveness,” says Delbius, as the medium is so new)
10. Avoid doing lots of old-style, manual retweets – the main reason Twitter’s internal retweet system was created was because of so many complaints about fake retweets (which, admittedly, are an ongoing problem), and it can appear to be reply spam to Twitter

This final tip is by far and away the most controversial (UPDATED: see below). Like many users, I’m a huge fan of old-style retweets because they allow you to add your own flavour and commentary. I do retweet using the new method from time to time, but only if the content is perfect as-is, which to be honest is pretty rare.

The cynic in me wonders if this statement has been made less out of truth and actual, bonafide advice, and more because Twitter is frustrated that so many users loathe and (in an awful lot of cases) completely avoid the new-style retweet. And so by introducing an element of risk they might hope to move people over in a shorter period of time. To be safe it might pay to be a little wary, although you’d think if they were really concerned they’d compromise and introduce optional annotation. But that would mean admitting they made a mistake – humility hasn’t been Twitter’s most well-played card.

On the upside, Delbius advises asking questions and retweeting items of interest to your followers, and generally being authentic. These are all plusses in the eyes of Twitter, particularly their spam team.

Also, curiously, Delbius mentioned the Miracle Whip (@miraclewhip) Twitter account as an example of an entity that is doing it right. Which, on an initial inspection, seems a little strange. But at least she didn’t go with the obvious. Or Charlie Sheen.

Lots to learn from here, and in our few interactions I’ve always found Delbius very reliable, but it might be worth taking some of these statements with a pinch of salt until they’re backed up with similar remarks from other members of the Twitter elite.

UPDATE: @Delbius has reached out to me on Twitter and clarified my concerns about the old-style retweets, as follows:

Something about it didn’t sound right, and I’m glad we’ve got that straightened out. The rest of her presentation is definitely worth taking on board. Unless, of course, you are a spammer, in which case you won’t care, and probably won’t be reading this.

(Hat tips: Danny Sullivan, Del Harvey.)

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All of the above?

Take your pick. These are all relative terms – one man’s signal, and so on. But that doesn’t really matter, as you have the power. Truth? Twitter isn’t anything – except what you make it.

If you don’t like what you’re seeing in your Twitter stream, change it. Unfollow. Then unfollow again. Connect with people that fit your needs and wants. And if that doesn’t work out, move on.

Lather, rinse, repeat – until you’re satisfied. You, you, you. Forget what everybody else thinks Twitter should be – what do you think? What do you want?

Almost without fail, people who complain that Twitter is pointless, boring or noisy, are following too many pointless, boring or noisy users. It’s frustrating because it’s something that’s so easy to fix.

And if you don’t do anything about it then you can’t blame anybody but yourself, as it’s never Twitter’s fault or responsibility – it’s yours, and always will be.

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(You’ll notice another annoying feature of this new build is that it is mis-dating tweets. On the upside, it pleases me immensely that this submission from the lovely Elizabeth has been immortalised forever.)

The add-on has already been re-coined as the Dick Bar by technology pundit John Gruber, in honour of Twitter COO Dick Costolo and, well, because it’s kind of a dickish move – especially in light of previous comments he made about how Twitter’s advertising masterplan was going to be innovative.

“It will be fascinating. Non-traditional. And people will love it… It’s going to be really cool.” ~ Dick Costolo

Sure.

Dave Winer elaborates at Dickbar.org.

Gruber is referring to the first rumblings of the promised business model from Chicagoan Dick Costolo, the (relatively) new CEO of Twitter. He, I conclude is 1/2 of the “dick” in dickbar.

The other half is how you feel for believing that Twitter would do something classy and interesting with advertising, as we were promised when, the newly minted COO of Twitter, the same Dick Costolo told us we would love their advertising. Yeah uhuh. Us East Coast guys have a bridge we’d like to sell you. It connects Manhattan with the great borough of Brooklyn. Real cheap.

This is not only a lousy idea from Twitter, but it’s also been implemented poorly. The people aren’t happy, and despite what Costolo has said I wouldn’t be at all surprised if this feature is removed or options are provided to tuck it away in the next update.

(PS. Want your own Dick Bar for your website? For reals? Get it here.)

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Well, times change, and Kutcher is rapidly on his way out of Twitter’s top 10 most-followed accounts. Give it a few months, and he’ll be gone.

And if all that wasn’t bad enough for Ashton, now his Twitter profile has been hacked. And the exploiter’s messages have been retweeted by hundreds of people.

Kutcher, who is currently attending TED 2011, appears to have been hacked by somebody with a very firm agenda – namely, Twitter’s insistence on using non-secure encryption for user sessions. Which in plain English means that while they maintain this level of security, everybody is at risk of being hacked, certainly if you access Twitter whilst out and about.

As senior technology consultant (and online security maestro) Graham Cluley explains at Naked Security:

Tools such as Firesheep make it child’s play for anybody sitting close to you to jump onto your Facebook or Twitter session if you’re using unencrypted WiFi without an SSL connection, for example at a free WiFi hotspot.

Wouldn’t it be great if Twitter forced the use of HTTPS at all times? Clearly whoever hacked into Ashton Kutcher’s Twitter account feels the same.

The insecure Twitter and Facebook accounts of some celebrities offer a very tempting target for cybercriminals who may wish to spread their dangerous or spammy links to millions of followers. We should just be grateful that on this occasion the hack appears to have taken place to promote better awareness of the need for better security, rather than with more malicious intent.

8 hours later, Kutcher’s account still appears to be hacked, as the messages are intact and nobody is doing anything about it. How embarrassing, especially whilst at such a high-profile, super-intellectual think-tank as TED. And you have to wonder if this would have taken so long to repair if Ashton was still Twitter’s top dog.

(Hat tip: Graham Cluley.)

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That checkbox that says ‘send updates to Twitter’? I get it. It’s so tempting. So convenient.

And so unnecessary, and so noisy.

If you’re not part of the signal, you’re part of the noise. And the noise is a LOT bigger, and likely always will be. But it’s a bit like anything else that seems overwhelming and not really your problem – you can make a difference, however small. Because all those teeny, tiny differences add up to a much greater whole. All of a sudden, there’s much less of a problem.

Yes, the perception of noise is entirely relative, but taking that stance is a real easy way to shirk responsibility. Deep down, we each know our contributory value – our ‘internet worth’, if you will. And if you don’t, Twitter will tell you.

Bottom line? If this is your idea of an acceptable journey on Twitter, then you need to think about taking a different route.

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Ahead of publishing this piece I reached out to Steve Crawford, the previous owner of Twitter.co.uk, and Twitter themselves for clarification. I emailed various contacts at Twitter, Twitter’s PR team, and Twitter support.

Crawford was courteous enough to come back almost straight away.
Twitter never responded at all. Until now.

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Three weeks. Three weeks to respond to a request for help – and then they send an automated response.

Okay, you could argue that the support team aren’t probably best placed to answer my query, but I was careful to pick the best subject for my enquiry and all somebody had to do was forward it on. Yes, I know they’re probably as far away from inbox zero as you could possibly be – so why not quit doing a lousy job, and just hire more people?

This isn’t an isolated incident – users complain about Twitter’s lousy support network pretty much constantly. Almost two years ago, a poll I conducted revealed that 81% of readers rated Twitter’s support as somewhere between below average and terrible. I’d be amazed if that number has come down at all.

And we wonder why the platform has such a high drop-out rate for newcomers?

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He’s right: Twitter is no longer a small company. It’s gone well behind being a simple ‘start-up’. This isn’t the 24/7 responsibility of four men, two servers and their dog. It’s a big frickin’ deal. And as such, we can’t keep making excuses for them when they’re slow to deal with major issues and bugs, or react to events in a manner that is both inconsistent and bewildering.

What works in Twitter’s favour is there is no alternative to Twitter. If you want to tweet, you need Twitter. There’s nowhere comparable that allows YOU to get your message out to the world. Facebook isn’t the same thing at all. But it won’t always be this way. Sure, others have tried and failed to take on Biz Stone et al, but you can guarantee that there are dozens – perhaps hundreds – of alternatives to the platform already warming nicely in an incubator somewhere.

99 per cent of these will fail miserably, but it all it takes is one. One legitimate alternative that starts out with a few cool features and then gets a whole lot better, and Twitter is suddenly in trouble. It can and does happen all the time on (and off) the internet. Nobody is immune, nothing is forever and few institutions are (realistically) too big to fail. You simply cannot afford to be complacent – no matter how important you are right now.

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