Illustrated Tweeting Tips
From Twitterdex
If there's one thing that's been bothering me lately with PokeTwitter, it's the fact that there are certain tendencies that users tend to fall into. So rather then sit idly and do nothing about it, I, Croconaw, would like to take a moment to show a few dos and don'ts when chatting to other users in PokeTwitter.
DISCLAIMER: While it might appear that I pick on certain users in these examples, know that almost EVERYONE is guilty of doing these common mistakes at some point in their Twitter career. I just chose recent moments to avoid digging through thousands of twits.
Contents |
General Tips
Replying in general
To begin with, I'm gonna show you a typical tweet:
This right here is a perfect example on how to do a proper reply. See how right underneath the post, it says, "In Reply to Croconaw"? This is because he used the function to reply to an individual tweet. It's important that you use this feature when having a long conversation with other users, as it makes it easier for users not talking with you to follow your conversation.
To use the reply feature properly, highlight someone's tweet with your mouse and click the arrow that appears on the right side.
(If you're not updating Twitter from the official web page and from another program, you usually have to highlight the tweet in said program and select the "Reply" option.)
Good Example
Here's a quick example of how a proper chain of replies should look.
All that was done with almost no effort whatsoever. All the two of us did was made sure we hit the Reply button on each tweet.
Easy, right? So start doing it!
Typing out actions
One thing that some users seem to do constantly is mistake PokeTwitter for a true RP. Mainly the fact that you shouldn't be typing your actions out. As has been said before;
This is Twitter. Use it for Tweeting, not engaging in true roleplaying. If you feel the need to put asterisks to describe your actions more often that simply saying what you're doing, you might be better off at a forum.
Yet every day, I see posts along the lines of this:
Let's just use some common sense here. If you were really in pain and felt the need to update your status, would you really type out *lying on the ground in pain*? Unless you're the world's fastest typist (and you aren't), you'd probably be more concerned about yourself and maybe asking someone to help you.
If you were meeting someone, would you say Hello, what have you been up to? I wanna hug! or would you say Hello! *wraps his arms around you hugging you*? Here's a hint; the first option is ALWAYS the option that happens in normal web conversation.
In case you've never noticed, no one other then you likes reading posts where you're describing what you're doing.
Godmodding
This goes under the same general idea of typing out actions in the fact that no one likes them. The only difference is that now you're controlling someone's actions and dictating what they can or can't do. This is just as annoying (if not more so) then typing out actions. Don't do it.
Everything past this sentence is WIP text to prevent forgetfulness
Tweet length
-try to make posts longer then two words
-short posts clog up everyone's feeds
-try sending one long tweet instead to two short tweets to the same user
-TweetLonger if it's necessary
-if no one else is around, don't send a large number of messages to no one
Linking to off-Twitter
-linking to NSFW is NOT okay, regardless of if you warned or not or site being linked to
-sites that ask for your twitter info will spam posts and annoy your followers (eg personality tests, tinychat)
-Tinychat asks for your Twitter info. Important to know not to do that and use the guest feature instead.
-IRC does not do this.
