I was dragged into the world of blogging by my client.  Not exactly kicking and screaming, but I confess it was not something I was looking forward to doing.  Now, a couple years later, I have several blogs that I write and am enjoying it more each week. Hopefully I’m becoming a better writer and that makes it easier for you to read. I know I’ve become a better editor of the topics I share.  Which brings me to the subject at hand: Twitter.

Twitter logo

Recently I was asked to try out Twitter.  For those of you unfamiliar to this new communication technology it’s a free (for now) service that allows you to post, via your cell phone or computer, short bursts of text – I believe 140 characters is the top limit – to share your thoughts, activities and what-not with whomever chooses to connect to your twitter account. It’s the ‘what-not’ that bugs the living daylights outta me.

Background
In the 1970′s I had the experience of working as the dispatcher for a small commuter airline in Northern California. Of course there were no cell phones and no personal computers. Very few people could afford beeper service. For instant communications we had normal telephones, teletype machines – that were cumbersome to use – and a radio service that was on all the time. Pilots would open the microphones in the cockpit and share critical information that we tracked regarding engine hours, departure times, air traffic delays, passenger and cargo manifests, etc.   This was an open radio frequency used by many pilots to communicate with one another and their base of operations. It was not exclusive to our business. This chatter was constant as pilots spoke to one another and shared tips on weather, traffic delays, etc.   But it wasn’t chaos. There was a protocol to be learned and certainly a code of conduct  to be followed with this efficient communication sytem. It wasn’t to be used for idle chit-chat, but for information that was necessary or worthy of attention by those who were tuned in.  Did I mention it was on all them time? Before we had invented the term 24/7 I would sometimes sleep at my desk in the dispatch room and awaken to the familiar voice of one of our pilots on an overnight courier mission. “Novato dispatch, this is Cal Com 25. Lift off from Elkhorn was at 02-hundred and ETA in Marin is 04-hundred. Over.” To which I would reply: “Roger Cal Com 25. Novato Dispatch.” Somehow I learned to tune out conversations about information that wasn’t intended and to tune in the pilots messages for me.

Every so often a newbie pilot or ground support would be heard, talking too much. Chatting if you will.  The other pilots would connect with him off duty and within a day or two the newbie would quiet down and fall into the proper behaviour that was expected in this professional culture where communication is very important to business and to safety.

Classic twitter-atzi conversation.

Twitter-maniacs
From what I’ve experienced the folks who use Twitter could take a lesson from that ancient communication technology of the open microphone system used by pilots.  After only two weeks of activating an account with Twitter I had to close it. I had a list of bloggers I wanted to try following via Twitter and dutifully established the connection to read their ‘Tweets.”  And within hours of starting the account it seemed I was solicited by numerous people I’d never met to request that we “follow” one another.  ‘Huh? Whassat? Duh – OK.” I didn’t know them and had no idea why they would want to follow me.

Here’s an example of what kind of goof-ball email I got from these clowns, and I do mean clowns!

Hi, BarryCB (BarryCB)
Sparky the clown (Sparkytheclown9) has requested to follow your updates on Twitter!
Best, Twitter

I soon found out why all of these folks wanted me to follow them. They considered every waking moment of their life to be a veritable cornucopia of amazing and fascinating details.  And they share it on an almost moment-by-moment play-by-play of their every breath-taking event.  I learned about dietary habits – for example: how they took their coffee. I was privy to intimate conversations – for example: who they spoke to in the elevator or subway. And just about every thought that came into their head was shared with me to edify and uplift my poor miserable life – spilled out in 140 characters of less into my twitter account.  I was convinced these narcissistic twitter-nazis believed they were the most important people on earth. Net-Net: I was inundated with the most asinine comments and reports about the mundane minutia of daily activities that would bore a doting mother.

The first to go was my cell phone twitter account. I was getting text messages from more than one source about the exact body count in the line at the Starbucks they use.  Oh, and many posts about the temperature of the coffee, if the barrista had double cupped it and, of course  a review of the cookie, muffin, scone, donut, etc.  For some reason the need to share what you are eating is the most prevailing activity on Twitter.  At the end of one day I had more than 200 text messages telling me about food.  And none of it was interesting.

Then I realized I had several thousand ‘twitters’ ‘twiti’ ‘twitsi’ ‘tweets’ – beats the heck outta me what they are called – messages in my Outlook folder. Holy crap!  Of the handful that were worth more than a glance  it turned out most merely pointed me to their authors web logs where they had complied all of this twittich carp and called it their posts for the day.

I was getting ‘twitted’ with stuff that was so useless it makes email spam about enlarging my credit report look interesting. Stuff I didn’t need to read, didn’t care to read, and was better for not knowing or reading.  Evidently some folks believe this is the greatest communication tool since carving on cave walls.

I have a word to describe these enthusiastic users of ‘Twitter” —— “Twits.”  ~blm