To just not 'get' twitter?

[Geckos48]

I dont understand how it works, I dont know how you have conversations on it.

I was hoping there was a forum for debate but it doesnt seem to work like that? You can just mention people in comments or 'retweet' what they have said?

What is the point of it?

But greenbananas you come on here to talk to people you (presumably) don't know - Twitter's not a million miles away from that, just shorter and less anonymous...

I like books and reading but I'm willing to bet none of the writers I like are on twitter. Possibly because most of them are dead. The day Nabokov starts tweeting I'll take an interest. And so will a lot of other people, I'll bet

I use twitter for two purposes: to communicate with a small group of people that I 'know' and to follow and get information from a wider group of people I don't know.

So I follow some organisations and celebrity type people and that's pretty much a one way street - they tweet either about events, or news stories, or projects or if it's the celebrity types then sometimes just about their day. So I follow some accounts such as BBC News online magazine, or the local newspaper, and then people like Stephen Fry, Bill Bailey, Mark Gatiss, Reece Shearsmith because their tweets are interesting or funny and I enjoy reading them.

Then there are some people I know in real life or online and I follow them and get a few tweets about their day on my feed - so some are still at uni and I reminisce as they tweet about hungover lectures or essay deadlines, or some tweet about TV shows they're into and stuff like that. We all tend to comment on each other's messages and it might just be commiserating or suggesting advice or moaning about the weather. It's sort of like a group chat function in that way.

I also sometimes search twitter for news about what's going on - to find current articles or updates about people/projects/etc - lots of Doctor Who news being tweeted around at the moment - or to see what people are saying about real time events. So if the traffic is awful searching twitter for Bristol traffic would probably be the fastest way of finding out hey there's an accident on the M32 as people tweet about it. It was very handy when there was a bomb scare in the centre a while back - twitter had much more up to date news on where was being evacuated and what the police on the ground were saying than the local news outlets.

I only follow/am followed by about fifty people but that's how I use it.

Ha ha Karlos yes I admit that is a downside alright, the lack of dead authors tweeting. I like some living authors too though so that does me.

Although I do follow Shakespeare on it he seems to manage tweeting from beyond the grave.

nugget I know, I know. .. But I am completely anonymous on here, nobody knows who I am.

Facebook and Twitter are just so public and I am a bit too shy to post thoughts about everyday life in my own name.

Like I said, I accept this kind of social media may well be changing the world for the better. I am just a bit of a Luddite.

I also cant get into twitter (i am also not really a facebook person). How do you find people that are worth following?

I rarely use it as I have a PAYG phone and am not into sending people endless updates of the minutiae of my life. I'll mainly use it to publicise events I'm organising or involved in.
I think it's mainly for people in the public spotlight who can expand their fan base and keep their sponsors happy and people who prefer writing about their lives to living them.

I suppose I use it a bit like any other media.

So I choose to follow people whose news or opinions might interest me. So I will follow the BBC Breaking News and also The Guardian, in case any important news developments occur. And I'm interested in, say, the opinions of Caitlin Moran, so I also follow her.

So my Twitter feed reads like a series of people telling you the news or making observations on it. So a bit like a news website.

The hashtags just bundle together tweets under certain topics. So putting #haiyan into the search box would allow me to see all the tweets featuring that hashtag which reference the typhoon. So when certain events happen, you can find all the comments under that hashtag. It just makes it easier for other people to find tweets.

On the other hand, my friend uses Twitter solely to follow celebrities. She loves vacuous gossip and is thrilled to discover when a minor starlet is having her nails done.

Bit of a sweeping statement 2rebecca. I can assure you I don't send people endless updates on the minutiae of my life either and I'm not more interested in writing about my life than living it. There are many different ways to use Twitter - I'm sure some people use it in the manner you say is the main use but I personally don't tweet an awful lot but I read other people's tweets for various reasons. It's just another news source.

I tried twitter when it was in its' infancy. I was 'talking' to Steven Fry and that twat Jonathan Ross long before they had 50 zillion followers. Cba with it - pointless. FB is crap as well.

nickname I think I just went on it and looked for a few famous tweeters like Stephen Fry and then looked at who they follow or who follows them and also twitter will suggest followers based on who you follow etc. Or you can just follow news sites or journalists or whatever takes your fancy. takes a while to get into it and build up a list.

I use it for work but don't really get into it. Some twitter conversations are really funny, like the jaffa cake/Tesco mobile one that was referred to on here. I'm sure it would be more interesting if you were allowed more characters though.

Thanks Nugget.

I used to have an account but only followed celebrities & i found it boring. Also i found that it moved so fast & i couldnt keep up with the 10 or so people i was following. In the end it got too much & deleted my account.

Who says you have to use your full name? I use a handle just like I do on here.

Yeah it can get a bit much when you follow loads of people alright. I don't use it as much as I used to but still work check it daily. Waste more time on mumsnet these days

#baffled

A lot of slebs post on twitter.

I use Facebook for my RL friends and twitter to stalk follow celebs I like. Never the twain shall meet.

I don't get it either, but that's because I'm not overly interested in strangers' thoughts, or finding out what celebrities are pretending to do.

I like facebook as I live in Aus and lots of friends live in the UK so I can see photos (and put on photos of my darling boys and post about every bowel movement of course).

I get what it's for. But I don't get how it works.

If I want to ask someone or a service something, I have feud to tweet them. However, that message never ends up on their feed of messages.

So what's the point?

I use Twitter occasionally but can't raise much interest in it. I'm on Facebook but, less and less these days. For me its just too full of people craving online validation/admiration/ a massive ego stroke.

In the past couple of months I've resolved to be in touch with family and good friends more via phone, and visits. Its been nice..I don't bother with Facebook much now although there are a couple of specialist forums I like. Prefer it to Twitter tho..

I love Twitter.

Facebook is just so personal. You may as well be living in all of your friends arseholes it's that personal. Everyone in each other's business, sniffing around. I can't be dealing with it, it made me so anxious and insecure. I actually started to dislike people I like irl .

Twitter is funny. I follow 'famous' people who make me laugh, I learn stuff and I sometimes communicate with said famous people (some even follow me back !). It's not for in depth conversation or bumming people, it's quite simply for flicking through and having a chuckle at Hugh Laurie tweeting about a goat's intelligence level. It's light and fluffy entertainment.

I love Facebook so thought I would give Twitter a go, but as much as I try I still dont "get it" really although I do understand what its for.

I have joined Twitter twice now, in a point to get it.

That's two amounts of the time it takes to register on a social media site, that I'll never get back.

The problem with Twitter for me, is that most people's - even famous people's - off-the-cuff thoughts are actually dull as shit.

You wade though a load of dull musings and hash tags. What am I missing??!

I find twitter much better than facebook, but then I use it in a very different way. It's an excellent source of news on specialist interests - it works as a kind of filter. So you look on twitter to find news sources, journalists, academics, or just individuals interested in a particular topic and follow them, which then means you get a stream full of links to information from places you would never have time to look at yourself.

I also find I am much better informed about things happening locally - one-off events, new restaurants, free tickets to things, local politics etc - by following some local bloggers etc on twitter. I've also had interesting exchanges with various authors and musicians, reconnected with a few old friends, made some new friends (one of whom has just sent me a great list of things to do when I'm in her home town next month - I will finally get to meet her in person too), and seen lots of funny/cute/weird pictures and videos of animals...

Anyone, celebrity or not, who just posts boring trivia about their own life or uses it to publicise their latest book/film/CD I just unfollow.