I love Twitter. This was not always the case, but I have come full circle and have jumped on the Twitter bandwagon with everyone else. But, nothing’s perfect, and I have a few pet peeves to share, along with some collected from other Twitter users who were kind enough to contribute:
- Tweeple, Tweeps, Peeps – I’m sorry. I don’t know why. I can see how many people would think they’re sort of cute, but I really don’t care for these “words”, especially when used in the possessive sense. Referring to me as one of your Peeps makes me feel insignificant. (Don’t worry- I won’t hold it against you.)
- Lame, impersonal Auto DMs when you follow someone.
- People who only tweet links.
- People who only tweet strange, enigmatic thoughts. You have no idea what they mean and they never explain.
@johawke - Posting play-by-play for airing TV show. No spoilers, please–I’ve no cable & Netflix is behind two seasons! And…people who curse in their Tweets. Grow up! Get a chatroom! My kids are liable to see this.
@ElToroDeRata – Peeps who follow just to get followed.
@LynnEnsMom – horrid overwhelming hideous backgrounds.
@dtsn – when pressing enter on the twitter home page it does not submit the tweet box
@inspirationbit – too many duplicated tweets from the same person; huge FollowFriday lists; not including any Bio on Twitter page
@DavidJGarcia – 30 one-word @replies in a row. Ideal replies have enough context to add value for outsiders–otherwise: DM.
Your turn- what are your Twitter pet peeves?
People who only retweet or @reply without adding their own original content (even if it’s just “check out these links”). And auto-reply DMs, especially when they tell me who they are or what they do… yes, I know this already. It’s probably why I followed you to begin with!
@creativecurio
I just did a post & video on the same topic – Tweet Peeves!!!
After a disgusting run-in with one of my biggest pet peeves – litter – I found myself ruminating on peeves. My thoughts wandered to a site developed by my friend Josh Caricco – http://www.peevd.com. And I wondered, if a bunch of tweeple were to collectively voice their twitter pet peeves – a.k.a. Tweet Peeves – perhaps we could do something bigger than just collectively kevetch.
Perhaps we could crowdsource an etiquette guide for Twitter. A repository of faux pas, don’ts, and fail whales. A resource to learn from the mistakes of others. Ultimately, a go-to guide that would make the Twitterverse a better place to live (virtually, of course).
We’re asking folks to tweet their Tweet Peeves to @peevd. All results will be visible on peevd.com. Data will be compiled, aggregated, and released as a feature film/documentary starring myself and Josh with special guest appearances by Robert Scoble*, Jeremiah Owyang* and Ashton Kutcher.* NYT Bestseller to follow.
Check out the video http://juliagorzka.com/tweet-peeves
Sidebar – I heard about you years ago from my friend Chuck Dykes when you designed a blog for him and he told me how awesome your work is
To be honest, the whole Twitter concept is annoying. 140 characters of complete and utter useless non-sense. They’ll probably end up billionaires.
My biggest Twitter pet peeve is people who follow me with 20,000+ friends and their bio says ‘SEO expert specializing in helping your company reach its full financial potential!’
2nd pet peeve is people using the music feature that tweets what you are currently listening to and they change their song 50x a minute, resulting in 50 useless tweets.
Last pet peeve, when people I don’t follow back remove me and then re-follow me in hopes of me noticing them at the top of my list and finally adding them.
@Antonea – Oh yeah -totally forgot about your #2. That’s because I automatically unfollow anyone who tweets their music all the time.
@Julia – thanks for the info and nice comment from Chuck. Always good to hear things like that.
@John – I totally felt the same way you did a year ago. Twitter is not for everyone and a lot of it is certainly useless nonsense, but the rest of it is fun and useful, especially for those of us who work from home and can feel disconnected from the outside world.
@Lauren – Good ones. You know, I don’t receive all that many auto DMs, strangely enough. The last one I got was from Lorelle, who I would not have expected it from!
People who tweet “Only 170 more followers until I reach 1000, who can help me out?”
The obsession with celebrity tweeters is dull.
And I agree with Antonea about the music tweeting. Boring! I don’t mind if someone occasionally tweets about a great song though (and I mean occasionally).
However, twitter for the most part is a great social platform that I enjoy using.
I’ve got to admit I am also a little torn on the whole twitter thing. I haven’t been using it long and honestly I find it a little confusing!
There are SO many people on there and everyone wants to be “peeps” with everyone else, I can’t keep track of who is talking to who and what the heck they are going on about. Grrr!
I think I am slowly getting the hang of it though. I too despise the auto messages saying “thanks for the follow!” What’s the point except to fill my inbox?? It’s not polite people, it’s RUDE! LOL!
“too many duplicated tweets from the same person; huge FollowFriday lists; not including any Bio on Twitter page”
In this case, I have to admit that this situation is getting out of control, where they’re many Twitter pages haven’t include with any Bio at all! Honestly, isn’t it too hard to fill up your personal information on it?
Don’t take it personal, remember that most people use social network as a marketing tool. It may be an auto responder doing that for them.
This is like the whole world tweeting, you can’t expect everyone to be personal. Be cool though, take it as a tool.
In February I wrote a post dedicated to my top 20 Twitter pet peeves: http://www.lizhover.com/2009/02/my-top-20-twitter-pet-peeves/
I think you pretty much covered all my Twitter pet peeves. I’m still not a huge fan of the website but it’s I can’t deny that it can be a powerful marketing tool.
I swear to gawd…I have unfollowed twits (and I mean that as an insult) when they frickin tweet every 5 seconds during an important TV event, i.e., presidential debate, breaking news etc. I’m also kind enuf to TELL THEM, i’m unfollowing them due to their apparent unstoppable tweets
Or those who are just frickin lonely and feel compelled to document their every waking moment…GET A LIFE!
I am bored now that celebs have taken over. I used to follow Ashton, Demi and others-but MY GAWD..they too talked too damn much. i unfollowed them with the quickness.
It just seems to me you can’t say anything significant in short one liners. I never saw the point of it. It reminds me of 10 year olds doing IM with phrases like, “what’s up.”
Deb
I don’t like twitter too much simply because of the amount of spam coming from those auto-follower people. Obviously I could exploit this as well, but I find it a rather ineffective way of doing it.
Twitter does have a great concept, and eventually I will start using the account I signed up for months and months ago.
@Jared – yeah, but that’s easy to manage. Just don’t follow people unless you know them or know they’re not spammers.
“…People who only tweet strange, enigmatic thoughts. You have no idea what they mean and they never explain…”
this has its own special charm. personally I like it even
@trasss – I like this to a point, but if this is all they tweet and they never have explanations, it gets old.
I cant stand going to check my twitter an the main page is full of one persons tweets!
I like twitter but those spam messages by auto followers really annoy me a lot. Is there anything like akismat to stop these spam messages?