flirting with twitter

No, I don’t mean I’ve been flirting via twitter.

It took me a long time to sign up for twitter. I just didn’t get it. I didn’t understand what it would add to my life. I’m not interested in knowing the moment-by-moment minutiae of my friends’ lives, and I’m not interested in sharing mine. It already takes too much effort to sift through the daily noise, and I don’t need to invite more. Avoiding twitter made sense.

But lots of people whom I like and respect use twitter and regularly sing its praises. Some were incredulous that this web guy wasn’t interested.

So, a few weeks ago, I signed up.

I have to say I still don’t get it. For me, twitter is like a headlines-only newspaper. As I scan each day’s output from my friends, there are one or two amusing or interesting tweets, but mostly it’s noise. They don’t like Sarah Palin. Me neither. Who cares? They’re drinking excellent coffee and enjoying the weather. Yawn. Sorry guys, but I much prefer real conversations. It’s definitely nothing personal. I love all y’all. That’s why I’m following you.

In some ways, I like the good tweets less than the inane ones. A ten-word tidbit from my friend about hisĀ  son’s antics at school might make me chuckle, but it’s more satisfying to hear the whole story… or nothing at all. I suppose one could argue that twitter is doing exactly what it’s supposed to do in this example, by alerting me to a reason to contact my friend (to get the whole story etc. etc.). And I’m probably being a poop by seeing this as noise I don’t need.

Often there’s a URL that goes along with a tweet, and more and more I find that I just scroll past everything else as fast as I can. These tweets lead me directly to the whole story, and they’re where the headlines-only experience ends.

Having bitched, I will say there are signs I’m coming around. I may recant this whole post in a few weeks’ time.

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