If you’ve spent any amount of time on Twitter, you’ve likely received a TrueTwit validation direct message. It says something like “Nelly Nameless uses TrueTwit validation service. Please validate your account.”
If you think this practice is okay, you need a Twitter direct message refresher. And when you’re done reading THAT, we’ll tell you why this “harmless annoyance” (aka TrueTwit) is anything but.
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If you ever want to send a solid “eff you” to someone on Twitter you have a few options, depending on the amount of time you want to invest. From the most time-consuming to the least: You can create a troll account and harass them; send #subtweets directed at them and ignore their replies; or you can block them.
This last one might seem like a pointless action as it’s so simple to get around, but it’s actually not only the most time-friendly course to take, but it’s also the ultimate junkpunch because it stops them dead in their tracks. (Unless they’re crazy stalkers, then it probably just makes them angry enough to find you ‘in real life.’)
Here’s why:
Thank goodness Twitter didn’t exist when you were in high school, hmm? If you’ve ever said or thought that, you’ll appreciate the COMPLETE ridiculousness of this story.
A class president at a high school in Kansas said something negative about his school’s football team and got suspended for the remainder of the year.
He didn’t swear. He didn’t threaten anyone. The tweet wasn’t violent. But it made other kids angry. Yeah, that’s really all it took. This is going on the Twit List, definitely.
How many times each day do you see something on social media that makes me marvel at people’s lack of personal boundaries? Pretty often, we’re guessing.
One way folks feed into this ‘too much info’ (TMI) mentality is through live-tweeting.
Yes, live-tweeting can be great for breaking news and such, but do we want to read live tweets from someone pushing out a baby? If you’ve ever heard someone recount even a bit of the birthing process, the answer is a resounding NO. But someone did it. And we’re guessing that’s only the tip of this TMI iceberg.
We mentioned before that piggybacking on trending tragedies to promote a business was ill-advised, but what about other human interest-style breaking news? If the story has a happy ending (but still a fantastically horrible beginning and middle) does that change things? Is it ever a good idea to promote your business on the back of others’ pain?
The answer is clearly no, right? Well, we have some extentuating circumstances to present for your consideration that may change your mind. Let’s see if you agree.
During President Obama’s State of the Union address in February, Rep. Steve Cohen (D-Tenn.) was observed by the media sending questionable tweets, then deleting them from his Twitter profile.
PR Daily dove into Cohen’s reasoning behind his tweet and delete “strategy,” if it can be called that.
But the bigger question is whether or not this tweeting and deleting thing is a new, viable way to approach Twitter.
If you followed the Boston Marathon news last week on Twitter, you likely read lots of false information.
Many users tweeted the name of one “suspect” who wasn’t and there were endless “this is happening now!” assertions about events that (again) weren’t, from folks listening to scanners.
As a result, there a few red faces this week, embarrassed they tweeted such things – and kind of angry, it seems, at Twitter.
With 20 years of experience, AllThingsD’s Kara Swisher has seen more than her fair share of digital scandals. However, she says, when it comes to social media firestorms, the recent lashing blogger Adria Richards took after she tweeted about sexual harassment at a tech conference was an unfortunate one for all parties involved.
“It’s a terrible, terrible situation. Most of all, it’s an interesting issue regarding what social media can do right now,” said Swisher. “I’m not clear she should have published their pictures. I don’t know. It’s a great debate [around] what should have happened in that situation. When you’re irked by somebody in a car next to you, do you tweet a picture of them swerving into your lane?… But now you have these tools that amplify your voice. The question is how much amplification should you be doing?”
Read the full interview at So What Do You Do, Kara Swisher, Co-Executive Editor of AllThingsD.com?
– Nicholas Braun
You may have heard of Matthew Keys. He’s a journalist who was indicted by the Department of Justice (DoJ) for allegedly “giving hackers access to the servers of his former employer, the Tribune Company. Tribune owns the Los Angeles Times, which the Anonymous hacker subsequently defaced.”
Keys was also, until recently, the social media editor for Reuters. After being let go today, he shared the news organization’s Twitter guidelines – and they demonstrate the dangers of combining personal and professional tweets online.
Are you in awe of folks with a million Twitter followers? Even if you’re not, it can be a bit intimidating to tweet to someone with such a following, especially when you’re sending a critical tweet.
Most Tweeple are cool about it though and take tweets (of all variety) in stride – it’s kind of the nature of Twitter.
But some don’t.
And one ”Twitter Titan” pushed that ‘pissy’ button hard, demonstrating how head-inflating follower count can be . . . and what happens when Twitter Titans tumble.
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