I know I’m asking too much. I can already hear the objections: Twitter’s most endearing quality is its roughness, it’s simplicity. But the more time I spend on Twitter, the more I wish it had an enhanced set of features to make it’s instant interactivity a little bit more useful. Hey, I can dream…
1. Incentivize participation
It bums me out when I see a publication like @salonmedia or @nytimes, both of whom don’t really follow anyone and uses Twitter solely to broadcast their latest posts. Heck, as @filmlinc, I’ve been guilty of not mixing it up enough with the Twitter public about movies. That’s why sometimes I wish for the Twitter Police to start issuing warnings to all of those organizations who aren’t using the service for what it was meant for: conversation.
On the other hand, I’d be totally in support of a gold star program for outlets such as @mediabistro, who not only shows a tremendous dedication to customer service in their Tweets, but is also constantly serving up interesting content for media professionals. They are an example of a media organization that has confronted the unpredictable atmosphere of this new service and figured out how to use it to bring a lot of value into the lives of thousands of followers.
2. Integrate a client like Twitterfox
Everywhere I go, I am an evangelist for Twitter, especially to people whose professional lives have something to do with online media. But I constantly find that newbies have a really hard time “getting it,” and thus don’t hook into Twitter’s constant stream of bite-sized nuggets of valuable info. New users are left to discover clients that allow them to do work while Tweets are served up like IM’s in the background. Like StumbleUpon or De.li.cio.us, Twitter should supply people up with tools that allow them to use Twitter most effectively. If new posts were easy to follow without constantly having to log onto Twitter, I think newbies would jump in a little more.
3. Make a search function part of the interface
A good way to find people to follow is to search keywords on a Twitter search engine, but to do that at the moment, you’ve got to get off of Twitter and go to another site. I long for different ways of interacting with the information Twitter yields. Hashmarks are one way to follow multiple Tweets on one subject, but this approach seems pretty low-tech to me. An integrated search engine could create such an enriched interaction for Twitter users.
4. Help you separate the wheat from the chaff
At the moment, Twitter influence is built through number of followers and quality of interaction. Following people is a good way to build your number of followers, and also your influence. But the more people you follow, the harder is it to grab key info from the useful Tweets. I know this goes against what Twitter is about, but I wish I could filter out some less interesting Tweets for the ones that offer more valuable info.
5. Make me breakfast
Hey, while I’m making a wish list…
This post is tagged Twitter
4 Comments
I’m not quite sure how #1 or #4 would work out, but I like the ideas. When I first started with Twitter, I was very surprised by the lack of an integrated search from the site, as well as the client issue. So far, I’m not totally happy with any of the clients I’ve tried. Maybe I need to give Twitterfox a go, but it doesn’t look like it has everything ideal either.
I think Twitterfox is pretty good. It shows you @replies where you are part of the body of the Tweet, not the lead. Still, haven’t found anything to run two Twitter accounts at once!
#1 is my biggest pet peeve. I think Twitterfeed is the worse invention ever. It gives big companies the impression that they’re engaging in social media simply by hooking up their RSS feeds. They never talk to anyone or provide a useful service other than link dumping. Whenever someone starts following me, and all their tweets come from “twitterfeed,” I know there’s no real engagement, and I don’t follow.
That relates to #4. Aside from one or two rare exceptions, I follow actual people. I’ve become very particular about who I follow, and I do not believe in the “follow and and I follow you” philosophy. I use Twitter to get smarter and to initiate and foster connections with the people who can help me do that. I think as Twitter grows, the true believers are going to get a lot more judicious about who they follow and why. Going forward, the network we each create with Twitter is going to have profound effects on how we find information online, whether it’s finding a job or a recipe.
Glad to see you’ve started a blog!
Seamus, thanks for the comments! I’ve been thinking a lot about the aspect of community engagement that you touch on. More than just judicious following, I think that in some ways, representatives of media organization have some kind of responsibility to encourage each other to “do the right thing” within communities like Twitter. When I see people like MB offering so much value out there, it really makes me feel pressure to do a better job on @filmlinc. It’s a matter of raising the bar on each other, and I think Twitter really is handy in that regard. Obvs, @salonmedia can’t hear this, but whatevs, the right people are hooked in.
Thanks partially to this interaction and also an article I picked up on Twitter, I’ve been thinking a lot about “community responsibility” and what a “social media expert” is, if that concept actually exists. My latest post is about that, hope you enjoy!
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