Things I Hate About Twitter (But why I still use it)

I had a sneaky, cheeky little thought flash through my brain yesterday. Wouldn’t it be great if I could invent something to supersede Twitter? That would throw everyone to disarray. Just as they reached 10,000 followers…BOOM. There’s a new network in town.

Twitter has undeniably become and important networking tool. The web has now overtaken print as the primary source of news, and Twitter has been a major influence in that turnaround.

There are things I love about Twitter, but occasionally I wish I could go back in time to pre-2006, the year Twitter was invented. It sounds hypocritical to moan about Twitter when I use it, but that’s how I roll.

These are the things that I find irksome about Twitter….

It’s in Real Time- The fact that Twitter is in real-time means that it’s an incredibly fast-paced environment. Keeping on top of things, making sure that you have a consistent presence and following trends is hard work.

It’s time consuming- Since Twitter was invented, I use a certain percentage of my time maintaining my Twitter account and the accounts of others. That time could have been used for writing a quality article or spent outside exploring the country that I’m staying in. I seriously have very little time as it is, and now I have something else to worry about.

I am having too much fun to Tweet- Generally if I’m having fun or doing something interesting, I’m having far too much of a good time to be Tweeting it. I enjoy switching off and living in the moment.

Someone has always said it first- Even when I think I’ve Tweeted something really original, someone has always said it first. Tweeted an interesting article? Someone’s already done it. Tweeted something humorous about a trending topic? Someone’s said it and it was funnier.

Spammy, cluttered Tweets- There is a serious lack of personal status updates on Twitter. I want to hear something interesting about you and what you’re doing. I don’t want to see a Tweet full of # tags, @ signs and abbreviated words. There is so much noise on Twitter. @hashtag We’ll be having words.

Look at me!- Trying to attract the attention of strangers on the internet. It would be a little bit weird if Twitter were real life…

My ‘ordinary’ friends don’t use Twitter- The people I want to speak to most, are the people who don’t use Twitter. Many of the people who use Twitter work in media or web-related fields. About 5 out of my 537  ’Facebook friends’ have accounts on Twitter. Yeah. So my Tweets are reaching people within the business, but they’re not necessarily reaching out to others.

The popularity contest and using Twitter to gauge success- I’m not into popularity contests and trying to be the popular kid in school. It sometimes feels like influence, performance and success are being measured by the number of followers you have on Twitter. Twitter, Klout and other social networks can be manipulated to a certain extent. Just because you’re extremely sociable and good at building followers doesn’t always mean that you have a quality website.

Hash Tags for every day of the week- I’ve said this before in a previous post, but there are hash tags for every day of the week. #FF ( follow Friday) #TT (Travel Tuesday) TTOT (Travel Talk on Twitter every Tuesday). Every day is a ‘special’ day in Twitter land, making it hard to keep up.

Not making the most of things because you’re staring at your phone- If I’m constantly distracted by Twitter and typing on my phone, I feel like I’m neglecting other people and not really taking the time to absorb the moment.Unfortunately I don’t have the ability to Tweet and listen at the same time.

My Mum told me not to talk to strangers- “Don’t ever talk to strangers. Even if they offer you sweeties.” That’s what she said to me on a daily basis. Talking to people we don’t know from Adam is a little bit weird. But it’s Twitter we’re talking about.  So that’s OK.

So there. I said it. There are lots of things I hate about Twitter. There are also lots of good things about it, but that wasn’t the title of this post.

I find it useful for finding tips and articles, for getting breaking news, and for finding out what others think on a particular topic.

I occasionally find tweets that make me laugh, and sift out interesting links through all the junk.

I like it because celebrities can say what’s on their mind, instead of being misquoted in the media.

I like it because I can ask questions and get an answer, and it’s put me in contact with some cool people that I wouldn’t have met otherwise.

If I’ve had a problem with service, I’ve told the company directly and they’ve looked into it.

Opportunities can come out of it, and even if they don’t, you can have interesting conversations with people all over the world.

And that’s why I still use Twitter.

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