We liked them before they sold-old you poser.

As immature as doing this was, I guess it was our way to express how we felt, how we lost a bit of our coolness, and we resented it. Well, I’m sorry to say, this high school pettiness is happening all over again. But this time, we’re not talking about R.E.M. or NIN, we’re talking about Twitter, you poser.

Sorry Oprah and Ashton, you don’t get it

Recently, I discovered a site called Here Before Oprah. Essentially, it’s a way to prove that you were old-school and a fan of Twitter before Oprah discovered it and brought her legions of fans onto along (enter the fail whale, stage left). But, weren’t we the ones praising Twitter just yesterday? Weren’t we the ones pushing for more people to get on it? Was I the only one that got tingles when newspaper writers started asking Twitterati for their opinions on articles? So why the about face? Instead of embracing Oprah, why make the point that we were on it before her? To keep cool, I guess.

Add to this, recent posts saying that celebrities only see Twitter as a broadcast channel, that they only talk amongst themselves, and that they don’t see it for it “truly is”. Truly is. What a crock. Yeah, because we all “got” Twitter when it first came out. Uh huh, sure. Y’know, I don’t recall Twitter originally being designed for retweeting (RT for those of you who don’t “get it”), but all Tweeters do it these days. Like so much in this world, many things grew and evolved into something greater than they were originally designed for, or were truly meant for.

Dinner knives make great screwdrivers

How many of you have cell phones, but primarily use it for texting? How many of you own TVs and use them to babysit your kids? How many of you have used a dinner knife as a screwdriver? In the end, it doesn’t matter what a tool was originally designed for, each person will use a tool as they see fit. If they derive some value that’s important to them, then great! If not, who are we to jump down their throats and act elitist?

If we stuck to using things for what they truly were designed for, we wouldn’t have Krazy Glue, Post-it notes, pace-makers, nor Twitter itself (I do recall that the internet was originally designed for the military – what’s your name soldier?).

Twitterati, Schmitterati

Looking down at Oprah’s plunge into Twitter is shameful, and seeing her presence on Twitter as the end of it is ludicrous. The web is undergoing an age of engagement and collaboration, i.e., the ultimate in marketing. The web is engaging, accountable, and collaborative. All this elitist behaviour is counter to the evolution.

So for those of you who see celebreties on Twitter as a negative thing, grow up, and embrace their curiosity. Welcome them and be friendly… you web 2.0/social media “expert” posers.

Twitter is a great source of information, but who can keep up?

Twitter is a time-suck.

I’m not sure what the magic number of  people to follow is at which it becomes unmanageable to keep track, but personally, I think that number is around the 200-mark or so. By following so many people at once, there is so much noise and distraction – it is hard to concentrate on any one thing or any one person. As my friend and co-worker, Kirsten, puts it, Twitter is often like an echo chamber. So much content is re-tweeted, and so many conversations are going one at once that  it’s hard to pick out the new and meaningful content. Twitter can be completely draining – and that’s just wrong. Social media should be engaging and invigorating, not tiring and exhausting.

Get organized.

A screen shot of TweetDeck.

Following less people.

One option I considered, was to simply follow less people. I began trying to un-follow people that I either didn’t engage with, or stopped reading – but that proved to be a difficult task as well. Many of the Tweeters I follow tweet about all the mundane minutea of their lives:   like what time they woke up, or how hot their coffee is. So I thought, “Well, perhaps I can cut some of the noise by un-following these Tweeters!”. Then, just as I’m about to drop them, they tweet brilliance – insight that resonates with me so much that I must convince myself that having to read their silly posts is just the price of admission to be part of the thought-party. There went that idea, right out the window.

Taking a break.

Probably the easiest thing to do to avoid Twitter burn-out, unless it’s your job to be on Twitter all day, is to take a break. Accept that it’s OK not to be up-to-date with every single development. It’s OK not to constantly engage in conversation. Twitter will be there when you come back. Promise. The world won’t end, and you’ll feel great – trust me. Treat Twitter like chatting in a cafe. You wouldn’t sit in a Starbucks all day and night would you? (Gosh I hope not at least.) So why blow an entire day on Twitter?

Twitter is like a river. As much as it can quench your thirst for news and conversation – it’s humanly impossible to drink all that Twitter has to offer. It’s OK to take sips – and breaks. So how about it? Close the window. Disconnect for a while. Get out and get some fresh air and feel free to retweet me when you get back to Twitter in a day or so. Twitter can wait. Honest.

How about you? Have you ever experienced social media burn-out or other similar techno-stresses? How do you cope?