Tweet Off

What is the fascination with Twitter? I ask this question seriously. It's obviously extremely popular with millions of people and is perhaps the most written-about social networking service. I just don't get it. I understand that actual blogging, thinking up topics, putting thoughts into sentences and paragraphs, can be a time-consuming task. Micro-blogging, with a limit of 140 characters, can be an easy way to throw your thoughts out into the winds. What are you doing right now? it asks, and I guess my answer is, ultimately, "Nothing anyone cares about."

I understand Twitter's usefulness in real-time reporting. Live blogging in more than 140 characters can distract the reporter from the unfolding event, and Twitter is a great way to convey events as they unfold. Following reporters at last summer's party conventions, for example, was interesting, and I always enjoy checking out the Twitter feed one of our local reporters posts for City Council meetings even though, as a participant in the meetings, I'm reading them hours later. My life, however, holds little journalistic interest. Events here in my house unfold at a glacial pace. "Thinking about lunch," I might say around noon, and then an hour or so later I might be able to report, "Eating cheese." If I have one meaningful thought a day, or if one meaningful thing happens a day, it's been an eventful day indeed. Most days feature much more chaff than wheat.

Some people use Twitter as a form of chat. Rather than IM, they correspond in a series of Tweets. I see that this is easier than email in that one can hold simultaneous conversations with a number of people, all from one feed. But who really has that much to say? I sure don't. It's all I can do to think of a Facebook status update that anyone but my cat might be interested in reading, and I only post those at most once a day.

There's also something about the language of Twitter that annoys me. On Twitter, one "follows" and has people "following," as if the site is comprised of millions of prophets or philosopher-kings. I'm not a follower, and I don't want to be followed. It's annoying that Facebook has turned the word "friend" into a verb, but all in all I'd rather friend someone than follow her.

I don't want to give in and Tweet, I really don't. So please, let's all agree not to. If enough of us ignore Twitter, maybe it will go away.