Twitter for Dummies (15 page)
Read Twitter for Dummies Online
Authors: Laura Fitton,Michael Gruen,Leslie Poston
Tags: #Internet, #Computers, #Web Page Design, #General
A community leads
Twitter users have come up with an interesting way of recommending people to follow — something called FollowFriday. It uses a community-driven system called hashtags, which we cover in Chapter 9. Our friend Micah Baldwin (
@micah
, pronounced
Me-ha
) started it, and he has this to say about it:
In January of 2009, I sent a simple tweet: “I am starting FollowFridays. Every Friday, suggest people to follow, and everyone follow him/her. Today its
@jeffrey
and
@dannynewman
.” After a suggestion to add the hashtag
#followfriday
and four folks retweeting it, FollowFriday was born.
After a few months, more than 100,000 tweets with more than 300,000 recommendations are sent each Friday (it actually begins on Thursday U.S. time because it’s Friday overseas!) and it’s growing each week.
FollowFriday mirrors what happens in the real world. One person suggests a book to read, or a restaurant to go to, or a person you should meet, and if you trust them, you take their word. The concept is very simple: Write a tweet listing two or three people you follow that you think others should follow as well, and provide a bit of an explanation. (
Remember:
It’s only 140 characters,so be brief both with your recommendations and with your explanations!) For example,
“@pistachio @micah @gruen
are three people that make me laugh every day.
#followfriday
.” That’s it!
If you’re new to Twitter and you’re looking for people to follow, you can search for
#followfriday
at
http://search.twitter.com
to see people who have been recommended, or check out sites like
http://followfridays.com
and
http://topfollowfriday.com
to see frequently recommended Twitter users.
FollowFriday is exactly what makes Twitter great. It gives you the ability to participate, it’s easy, and you can share people you’re proud to know (even if it’s just on Twitter) with other people. After all, Twitter is about sharing information and experiences with people you’re proud to be associated with, in a very easy, participatory way.
Why Fridays? Fridays seem to work well because it’s the end of the week, and people have the time to think about whom they would like to recommend. Plus, FollowTuesday just doesn’t have the same type of ring, now does it?
Opening up your stream
By default, Twitter shows you all the tweets sent by each of the users whom you follow. But sometimes, during the setup process, users accidentally limit their feeds to include only tweets that aren’t replies — it’s a neat feature, but not always desirable.
To configure your Twitter stream so that it shows you all the Twitter conversations that include @replies written by the people you’re following:
1. Click Settings in the top-right navigation bar.
The Settings page opens.
2. Click the Notices tab (see Figure 5-4).
You see an @Replies section, with a Show Me drop-down list.
3. Select Show Me All @Replies from the Show Me drop-down list.
Figure 5-4:
On the Notices screen, you can choose which, if any, @replies appear in your stream.
By setting this option, when your friends post public @replies to other Twitter users whom you aren’t following, you still see those tweets.
Give yourself a little time to get used to the flood of information and figure out which @replies you want to see. You’ll soon find that your friends not only have valuable things to say, but their friends do, too. At that point, you can start to join the conversation, and broaden your circle of friends.
If you want your stream to be a little less crowded, you can opt to show No @Replies, which makes Twitter suppress any @replies from your stream. You won’t see any @replies at all if you choose this option. A third, middle-of-the-road option is to select @Replies to the People I’m Following. What this means is that, if you’re following both John and Mary, and John sends an @Mary tweet to Mary, you’ll see that tweet (even though it wasn’t directed to you) — which allows you to join in the conversation because you can see what your friends are talking about. At the moment, these settings only filter tweets that start
@username
, not those that contain
@username
within the message.
How to Follow People
Mechanically, following people on Twitter is dead simple. After you navigate to a person’s Profile page, click the Follow button just below his avatar. And, you’re done! Give it a shot:
1. Browse to
http://twitter.com/dummies
.
2. Click the Follow button.
The button changes to the word Following. Cool!
Alternately, you can post this message from SMS or any Twitter interface by typing
Follow username
or
F username
.
Following people on Twitter is straightforward. On the most superficial level, you just have to pay attention. Twitter is full of thousands of great conversations going on all around you. If you open yourself up to them, you may find that hundreds of excellent people are thrilled to meet you.
Replying to Tweets
So, what happens when you receive an @reply, and you want to respond — or if you just want to respond to any tweet, for that matter? Hover your mouse cursor over the right side of the tweet in question when you see it in your stream on Twitter’s Home screen, and images of an arrow and a star appear (as shown in Figure 5-5).
Clicking the Star icon bookmarks that tweet as a favorite — which we cover in Chapter 3. But clicking the Arrow icon sets up the Twitter entry field so that you can reply to that individual tweet. When you send your response, it says In Reply To below the tweet and includes a live link to the standalone page (also known as a
permalink
) for the tweet you responded to. Figure 5-6 shows a typical Twitter @reply.
Figure 5-5:
Don’t miss the Reply arrow!
Figure 5-6:
You can respond to tweets by using @replies.
You may find these permalinks helpful because Twitter is not great at threading tweets together by conversation. If you’re familiar with a set of @replies and the links associated with them, you can much more easily navigate the conversation later. When you know how to access the individual page for each tweet, you can also link to that tweet directly if you choose to respond to it in a longer format outside of Twitter, such as a blog post.
You can reply to any tweet that you can see, and the procedure is the same, whether you’re following the person or not. But, assuming your Twitter account is public, your @replies are public, too. If you want to use Twitter for private messages, the protocol is a little different, as we talk about in the section “Direct Messaging,” later in this chapter.
Go ahead and jump right in
Given the casual and conversational tone of Twitter, you can pretty easily jump into an existing conversation on Twitter, and (unless you’re trying) you don’t look like you’re barging in. Twitter users are aware that this is a public forum and contributions can come from anywhere and at anytime. Start by clicking one of the usernames involved in the conversation, or enter one or both usernames manually in the Update window. (
Remember:
The format for addressing a Twitter user is
@
username
.
) Then chime in by saying something relevant to their discussion.
Don’t rush to be conversational to the point that you end up being irrelevant. If the conversation is about something you don’t know anything about, hold off. But if it’s about a movie that you’ve seen or a business theory that you’ve put into practice, pipe up!
It may take a few tries with a few different people to get the ball rolling. Don’t be discouraged if you send out a few @replies and don’t get responses; some Twitter users, especially relatively new ones, don’t always pay close attention or respond to @replies either from people whom they’re not following or those who don’t seem particularly perceptive to them. Many people on Twitter, however, respond very quickly to new voices in their Twitter stream because, for many on Twitter, the point is to be conversational.
Be patient about expecting replies to questions that are easily answered using Google or other resources. Also please be patient with people that a lot of people talk to. Demi Moore, for example, does a great job of conversing with the hundreds and hundreds of people who write to
@mrskutcher
every day, but if she tried to answer everyone, she would have no time to be with her family (or for that matter, to be beautiful and entertaining in her films!). To see how busy her @mentions tab is, just search
@mrskutcher
(
http://search.twitter.com/search?q=%40mrskutcher
).
Direct Messaging
Private messages on Twitter are called direct messages (DMs). Like any other kind of tweet, they’re limited to 140 characters in length. You can’t send a DM to someone unless that Twitter user is following you — likewise, only your own followers can send you DMs.
What do you do if you want to get in touch with someone privately on Twitter but that person isn’t following you? New Twitter users are often tempted to send @replies to that person saying “tried to DM but you don’t follow” or something of the sort. Some Twitter users don’t mind receiving those kinds of tweets, but many others see them as rude or as blatant attempts to get new followers.