Twitter has almost a satirical quality to it: Keep your followers in the know about your status update while hyping up everything you like and appreciate on the web, meanwhile good intentions can become misconstrued as rude, obnoxious and/or invasive.  It’s a delicate balancing act because most Twitter users do not personally know theirfollowers, and cannot be completely in tune with their sense of humor (or lack thereof in many cases).  Therefore, just as in life, one must think before he/she speaks (or types in this case).  Having said that, security, freedom of movement, and the social caste system based on mutual appreciation is what is hampering Twitter’s further legitimacy as a real contender to Facebook.

I’m sure you are familiar with the short story Rip Van Winkle by 19th century American author Washington Irving.  After taking a nap for twenty years during the American Revolution, Rip wakes up to lament, ‘‘The very character of the people seemed changed’’ and although there is still a crowd gathered around the local inn, the conversation carries ‘‘a busy, bustling, disputatious tone about it, instead of the accustomed phlegm and drowsy tranquillity’’.  Rip’s ignorance and sheer laziness are irony at it’s best in light of the political activism that surrounds him.

So what does this analogy have to do with Twitter?  Well, some might suggest that there was a synapse in communication, a disconnect within American society, that led us, like Rip, into a deep sleep.  From this unconscious state social networks like MySpace, Facebook, and eventually Twitter were born to serve as catalyst of what I like to call dialogue activism.   Now don’t get me wrong, I am a strong advocate of social media and web 2.0 (I help launch these types of campaigns and still believe in them), but at the same time the enterprise will reach it’s peak soon because we are beginning to realize some of it’s limitations.

Despite it’s enormous popularity, Twitter clearly still has security issues (remember the DDOS attack this summer?) and the pretentious  merit-based system follower acquisition is based upon lends itself to credibility issues.  Those are some of it’s drawbacks.  The “I rub your back, you rub my back” approach to building a following in one’s rise to fame and users who auto-tweet quality content condemned as “robots” are at the underbelly of the social network being propelled even further.  Syndication is a vital part of web 2.0, and stereotyping this methodology of content delivery stagnates the flow of information.

Here are my two main considerations I take into account when deciding whether or not to follow someone on Twitter.

1. Quality of their content – In particular I look to follow people or businesses that have a personal side as well as a professional authority within their respective field.  I also don’t believe in unfollowing someone who is not following me.  If they are not interested in my goods and services (namely what I had for lunch and Wordpress plugin updates) I can still sleep soundly at night.

2. Network Flow – If I choose to follow this person or business will I be expanding or contracting my presence to persons or businesses I am looking to reach?  You can have 20,000 followers and follow someone with 20,000 followers, but is there any real potential for developing meaningful relationships?  Yes the odds are better, but believe me there are plenty of users with tons of shadow followers that cannot serve any meaningful purpose should I follow them.

Now I know you might be saying to yourself, “Stop your #Twhining“.  You’re right.  There should be more positive messages being sent across the social media (and mass media) airwaves right now.  This is a call to action to continue the ongoing quest to share freely, be of service, and not always look for what’s in it for me.  There is a reason why Facebook continues to soar and why Twitter has recently gone sour.  I might be a little idealistic, but I believe there is still hope.

With the birth of virtualization and cloud computing, it’s been suggested that there is an infinite supply of data space and bandwidth, just like we believed the same was true about electricity for centuries.  Only now are we starting to understand the necessity for green energy and conservation.  The fluff has to be dusted away to allow the meaningful conversations to take place, and for people to gain credibility not because they re-follow everyone, but because they are breaking news or are sharing something completely unique.  Humor, step-by-step guides, insightful debate, new technology updates, and events are important to pass along.  Whether I used 1% or 2% milk in my cereal this morning is kind of irrelevant.