The other day I was tweeting with Tiffany Shlain (IMDb), director of Connected: An Autobiography About Love, Death & Technology when she came out with this amazing zinger I thought I’d share:
Twitter tickles my gray matter…
I thought it was so great I’m reproducing it here, adding a few additional flourishes (hey, would you have expected any less here?) about my overall usage of Twitter and why I’m now a believer. Tickle away!
I’ve been on the platform since ‘08 (or at least according to HootSuite), but didn’t devote much to it prior to this year. Honestly. I think I was languishing around 1,000 or so followers for a couple of years back there.
As you can see from my paltry present 1,800-weak follower count, Twitter’s not a place I’ve spent an inordinate deal of time over these four years. By all accounts, I should have at least five times that number considering the sheer amount of hours I devote daily ‘netting and for entertainment purposes, in general. Still, the number refuses to budge skyward and I seem to be stuck in, I dunno, third gear over there. What’s up?
Why is this the case?
I talked about it recently here. I suppose it’s also because the bulk of my social media exposure has mostly been on Facebook, where my following numbers 4,500+ strong and where discussions tend to be more steak-like, less gravy-train capricious, less easy-come/easy-go, and far chewier. My overall audience’s participation there has generally been more consistent and fruitful. whereas Twitter followers come and go like the wind. Twitter success – save for A-List celebrities and porn stars – is fleeting at best, like a tornado, a tsunami, or a Texas gale.
But the end of this year brought the “prodigal son” back to Twitter and I’ve been having a right blast. My gray matter has not only been been tickled with a Roman feather, but given the NFL-style major post-Super Bowl rub down.
Tiffany’s quote sums things up best for me, I believe, because the 140-charactered platform seems to have become something far different these past couple of years.
No longer is the twitteratti tweeting about:
- how much marmalade they’ve spread on their seven-grain toast this past morning.
- how few hours they’ve slept and how utterly exhausted they are as they kvetch — comatose-like — in front of their ‘puters telling you how unjust and unfair the work world is and how much they have yet to do.
- how busy their day is shaping up to be and how happy they are it’s damned Hump Day already (so “busy,” in fact, they get into tweeting flurries with their dozens of loyal — and equally-“busy,” I might add – followers).
- how happy they are the weekend’s finally night because they’re going to crash…hard, hard, hard.
- how upset they are it’s only Monday, but how they plan on getting through the remainder of the week intact but bearing down on their stack like a corrida bull on steroids.
Now what we’re seeing instead (evidenced by massive Tweet boards like the Muck Rack) is:
- value-added posts by industry pros and resident experts in their respective fields of endeavor. If you, like me, spend hours on Twitter, you know you can virtually obtain a full-course education there. There’s a lot of knowledge on Twitter – as opposed to the chintzy, dreck-y, fluff of the past (eg. “Corn Flakes Tweets”).
- breaking news positioning you in front the pack: I heard about late North Korean dictator Kim “Bam Bam: Jong-il’s timely passing within twelve minutes of its announcement on State North Korean TV. Faster than most of the major news organs, I presume, and all because I maintain a robust Korea, Japan, and China Twitter following, the announcement breaking right during the fat of that time zone’s work day.
- celebrities revealing sides of their personality previously unseen: the sorts of reactions their handlers would forbid them had they their druthers. Twitter also affords celebs and A-Listers the chance to demonstrate their savvy on a particular issue, again in ways they’re unable to do under more controlled conditions when they have to clear “The Message” through layers of obfuscating media interference.
- much more civil before than in years previous: coupled with the realization, too, that tweets are fully archived, hence the imperative now for the twittersphere to maintain decorum and avoid furiously casting about f- and s-bombs (and other 4- and 7-lettered epithets). There’s a lot of Gary Vee’s “thank-you economy” going on these days…
- friendships created and relationships cultivated via the platform: I, myself, can speak to this. I’ve forged two strong Twitter friendships thus far. I’ve organized meetings through the platform. I’ve also converted a couple of excellent Twitter-to-real-life (aka “carbon life form”) friendships thus far and because of it am able to keep certain personal and professional relationships steady in ways I might not have been able to do previously, converting to my small business’ bottom line. And 2012 is looking set to be no different. I always keep in mind the reality that there really is someone else on the other end of the line.
So does Twitter merely tickle my gray matter? Naw, my babies…for 2012, I expect a fulsome shiatsu massage and then some…
And I’ve got Tiffany Shlain to thank for that!
Adam Daniel Mezei, PMD | Producer of Marketing and Distribution
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