Twitter shmitter….honestly. Who invented such nonsense? Does anyone really care that you are eating a hot dog for lunch or that you were up at 3 a.m.? Do I really need to know such things instantly? I have received several invitations to join Twitter…all of which I promptly deleted from my inbox while cackling like a maniac. Twitter is like IM’s gone awry. You get these messages, completely unsolicited, at all hours of the day which, by the way, reminds me of spam mail. I HATE spam. In fact, I believe I have lost a few friends over spam mail. Those friends felt it necessary to send me every urban legend circulating the world wide web, advice of quacks from unverified sources, scare tactics, etc. All the while I am reading this junk thinking “You gotta be kidding me!”. When I finally grew weary of hitting delete 105 times every time I opened my inbox, I finally sent a “friendly” little note asking my “friend” to please stop sending me such junk. Most of them quit sending me anymore email. Period. Well, if ya don’t have anything good to say, THEN DON’T SAY IT! Or, in this case, forward it (or Tweet it). 🙂
Now, when I open my WordPress account, a little banner is on the screen asking me if I want to add Twitter to my blog. They should have left me a little box to check “No”. I am wondering, though, how in the world does that work? Do they send your blog posts to all your Twitterers? I guess I will have to read up on that.
Earlier, I decided to Google the word Twitter. I came across several people discussing Twitter as being the new microblog. Microblog? Is that a new name for text messages? Honestly.
Now, I know what you are thinking. You are wondering why, if I have such a disdain for reading everyone’s business at all hours of the day, why am I blogging? The answer really is simple. I don’t really care if people visit my blog or not. It is mainly for my personal journaling purposes. Could I write in a diary instead? Sure. But journaling in a weblog is much more fun and I can upload pictures! The difference between reading blogs on the computer and receiving “Tweets” is that when I read blogs on the computer, I am soliciting. I can control who and what I want to read about. When I receive Tweets, they are unsolicited. With Twitter, people would intrude on my privacy and work, at all hours of the day, whenever they deemed fit. I am sure that there are good uses for Twitter. But, for now, count me out!
Andrea
***UPDATE: At least I am not the only one who has electronic social overload. Check out this article, I laughed my way through it. Here is an excerpt:
Are you a twit if you don’t want to Twitter?
Published: 4/8/09, 4:06 PM EDT
By MARTHA IRVINE
CHICAGO (AP) – Eily Toyama gave in after friends pestered her to join Facebook. But she used her cat’s name instead of her own so she could avoid networking requests from people she didn’t really want to connect to. And don’t even ask her about Twitter unless you want to get an eye roll.
“I just don’t think people need to know that much about my life,” says the 32-year-old Chicagoan, who works in information technology.
Call it online sociability fatigue. And it’s not just being felt by older folks who have lived most of their lives without the Web. As social networking grows, from stream-of-consciousness Twitter to buttoned-up LinkedIn, even some of the very young people who’ve helped drive these sites’ growth could use a break.
Mike Nourie, a student at Emerson College in Boston, says he feels a little relieved to escape social networking when he works summers at an inn on Cape Cod where connection to the wired world is spotty. For more, click here: Are you a twit if you don’t want to Twitter?
Perpetual Renovator 