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Eight Things I Hate about Twitter

First of all I need to qualify the title, by saying I love Twitter, use it every day and gain benefit and a great deal of pleasure from it.

Nevertheless, there are some things that really, truly irritate me about it, and here they are:

1/ People describing a link to their sign-in page as a “gift” for me

2/ Photos of people taken from oblique angles – this started on Facebook – what the hell is it all about?

3/ And whilst talking about photos – ludicrously white teeth!

4/ Any person who takes up more than 50% of a page by tweeting incessantly

5/ Those horrendous “Let’s spread some love today, everyone!” type of Tweets

6/ Bios that read something like “Author, motivational speaker, web 2.0 wizard, fitness coach, CEO, marathon runner, Dad to 5 kids, Scout Leader.” Really?

7/ People tweeting that they’ve achieved 300 followers in 24 hours

8/ Using a celebrity name to attract gullible fans like me – Lewis Hamilton!

Sorry for the rant, but I’m sure some of you will agree with these! And I’m sure some of you can add to them – please comment and I’ll do an update with your comments – we can produce a top 100!!

If you are new and want to learn about Twitter, check out The Beginners Guide to Twitter

You should also read:

1/ Eight things I love about Twitter

2/ How I use Twitter

3/ Stop telling me how to tweet!

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Twitter

Submitted by The Almost Millionaire (not verified) on January 1, 2009 - 18:26.
The Almost Millionaire's picture

You are right on with the twitter hates. I would add that I hate auto responding direct messages after I follow someone!
Happy New Year!
Brandon

Interesting, but I don't

Submitted by CMoz (not verified) on January 1, 2009 - 21:34.
CMoz's picture

Interesting, but I don't agree with number 3 or 5 at all. There's far worse things about Twitter (which I also love).

Now can I be a little personal? You say you want to be a professional blogger, but for me - and its only my personal thoughts, but I rarely go to peoples blogs that are cluttered with ads and things that are 'unnecessary'. I usually log straight off them. Your user log in for example should maybe come after your 'pages' cause I am assuming most of your readers atm are not members, so we are missing your content (the most important part of your blog?).

Anyhow, I guess your priority is to make money, but that is kinda how your site looks, which can be off putting, users want to feel like you actually want them to read something that's of use or benefit to them-keep them coming back and they just might make that donation.

Just my 2p worth.

Hope it all works out well for you, and have a great 2009! ~

Thanks for the comment Cmoz,

Submitted by Mike on January 1, 2009 - 21:54.

Thanks for the comment Cmoz, and I'm happy to take all the help and advice I can get. Good point about the log in and I'm going to move it now. I also agree the site's a little messy and I'm gradually learning how to make it less so.

Thanks again, and please look in when you have a chance and let me have any other advice you may have - I'm only 16 days into this!

Mike

Lookin good

Submitted by CMoz (not verified) on January 2, 2009 - 20:31.
CMoz's picture

Hey Mike
The changes are great. Keep at it - hope you get positive feedback from other readers.

Thanks CMoz!! And yes the

Submitted by Mike on January 2, 2009 - 23:40.

Thanks CMoz!! And yes the comments are starting to come in - it's very exciting!
Mike

More Dogging on Twitter

Submitted by @Steelengen (not verified) on January 5, 2009 - 13:52.
@Steelengen's picture

I'm a Twitter lover as well, but there's certainly things I can't stand. The constant Tweeting is one. I like it when folks tweet alot, but I hate when they turn Twitter into their own personal IM client. I tend to stop following people who do that regularly. I also hate the super-fake profile pics (The super white teeth you mentioned for example). Jim Connolly's recent blog post Twitter Photo Shock from Photoshop is a great (and pretty funny)example.

These are funny! I like the

Submitted by Miguel (not verified) on January 5, 2009 - 16:18.
Miguel's picture

These are funny! I like the one about the photos, they are really terrible.

People have hidden yearnings

Submitted by Dr. Roger Portland (not verified) on January 14, 2009 - 18:55.
Dr. Roger Portland's picture

People have hidden yearnings to be famous, so Twitter somehow fulfills that for them. After all, it's a function of the social network in cyberspace. The same is also true for blogging.

Twitter foibles

Submitted by Marlene (not verified) on June 25, 2009 - 00:13.
Marlene's picture

Aha, so there is the hint of a cynic in you, Mike.

It's true I would like to be able to tell people I'd appreciate seeing their face more if it wasn't ALL THE WAY down one side of my profile page - and I could, of course, if it ever got TOO frustrating. But if it came to that, it could turn into a full time job.

And the white teeth? Funny but I never noticed.

Except for when something absolutely MUST be dealt with, I try not to dwell on the minor frustrations of life. It's never going to be perfect this side of the rapture, in Twitter or anywhere else. And if it MUST be dealt with, I try to find a way to do that, rather than wasting time and energy complaining. Not that it isn't easy to slip into that!

Now a list of things that could be done about the things that frustrate us - that would be something! And judging from your many helpful posts, you could be the man for it!

All the best,

Marlene

Correction

Submitted by Marlene (not verified) on June 25, 2009 - 00:22.
Marlene's picture

All the way down one side of my Home page, not my Profile page. Of course.

Good to see you here

Submitted by Mike on June 25, 2009 - 07:04.

Good to see you here Marlene! I do my best to avoid cynicism and hope I veer more towards irony, but I know what you mean! I like the idea of the post about how to deal with things that frustrate us - watch this space!

Mike

The thing that drives me

Submitted by Clare (not verified) on July 8, 2009 - 16:42.
Clare's picture

The thing that drives me nuts about twitter is trying to follow a conversation. I get @messages and have no idea what they refer to and have to trawl back through my own tweets to see what the other person is on about. There should be some kind of bread crumb trail.

The latest thing that is driving me nuts and has only happened so far with one person - is getting general tweets via DMs - a new follower who is in all other respects OK - not a commercial sales page type - has started sending me tweets on philosophy or psychiatry via DM presumably he does this to make you read them. Anyway I DMed him back telling him to cut it out or I'll unfollow - fingers crossed he will realise not good tweet behaviour.
Clare

Agree with both of those

Submitted by Mike on July 9, 2009 - 07:10.

Agree with both of those Clare. The answer to the first should be with the sender - when you tweet reference the original. "About BMW's, I think...."

The second is really annoying, and I've asked people who do it to stop.

Mike

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"Mike's Life is where you can stay current with the life, thoughts, successes and failures of Mike Cliffe-Jones. Never knowingly ordinary, Mike shares as much as possible about his work as an author and CEO of two companies, as well as his enviable lifestyle on and in the oceans around The Canary Islands."

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