 What puzzles me is that anyone would want to let complete strangers
know where they are and what they are doing at any particular
moment. I thought it was creepy when Santa Claus knew when you were
sleeping and if you'd been good or bad."Yes," these fanatics tell
me, "but you don't have to let strangers see your tweets." The
problem is that many people think that if they have heard someone's
name or carry their business card, they are no longer strangers: as
if axe murderers don't have jobs or names.
It's become a status symbol to have a high number of "followers"
on Twitter, so why wouldn't you adopt someone as a friend just for
follower bragging rights?
Tweets, by the way, are the posts made to your Twitter account.
These posts have a limit of 140 characters -- just enough to let
someone know that you are taking the dog for a walk, or taking a
shower, or leaving for Jamaica tomorrow. Presumably, this is so your
followers will know where and when to send a hit man.
I tweet regularly (which sounds obscene), but I'm not really sure
why I bother. My PR people, my husband, the loony lady who lives in
my head and a toothless old woman who smiles at me on my way into
Wal-Mart tell me that I must use every tool at my disposal to
promote myself and my column. I have a total of four Twitter
followers and one is my husband, so I fail to see how this will
further my career in any appreciable way.
Also, it's kind of irritating to realize that if Twitter is the
tool and tweeting is what you do with it, then -- I did the math (or
English) -- those who use Twitter to tweet must be referred to as
twits. In 1999, this was considered an insult.
Don't get me wrong, I'm not against letting friends and family
know what is going on in my life. In fact, if I've just gone
somewhere warm and tropical, I can't wait to show off my sunburn.
[to top of second column] |
 On the other hand, I don't really think anyone I know would be
interested in what stain I found on my daughter's skirt or how I
conquered the garbage disposal.
I suppose if I lived in the Amazon and was living with a remote,
primitive tribe of natives, my life might be more interesting to the
average National Geographic reader. I wonder if they still have
dial-up in the Amazon.
Perhaps the stains I found there would be so unusual that women
around the world would tune in just to compare. Or maybe my means of
disposing of garbage without regular trash pickup would be
noteworthy to a certain small percentage of people.
In 1999, when someone wanted to know such details about you, we
called them nosy and told them to mind their own business. Now we
invite them to view a news feed.
My fellow twits, may I simply encourage you to tweet only
high-minded, profound thoughts and nuggets of wisdom that will
benefit our superfluous society and provoke thoughts that will lift
our generation up rather than plunge us into a digital swirl of the
mundane?
For an example of such high-minded and profound thoughts, see my
tweets by going to
http://twitter.com/LauraOnLife ... and if you wanted to become
my follower, I wouldn't consider you a stranger.
[By LAURA SNYDER]
Laura Snyder is a nationally syndicated columnist,
author and speaker. You can reach her at
lsnyder@lauraonlife.com
or visit www.lauraonlife.com
for more info.
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