Over the past few months I have been “hitting” twitter pretty hard - exploring what value might be had through growing the number of people I follow, and who follow me. It turns out there is very little appreciable value, and it’s inversely proportional to the amount of time suck involved.
Playing with Twitter has been educational though - if only to annoy the crap out of me. Correction. Twitter doesn’t annoy me - people annoy me.
Forgive me for being rather flippant, but “Social Networks” exist to help people “Socialise”, don’t they? The clue is in the name. They were never intended as a fishing ground for enterprising trawler captains to throw nets into (sorry for the fishing metaphor - I watched “Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs” with our children the other evening). To realise the ridiculousness of their behaviour, you need to transmogrify it into the real world.
Imagine you’re walking down the high street, minding your own business. Suddenly a person appears running very quickly between people, jamming business cards into other people’s pockets and bags. It turns out this person doesn’t have a normal name like “John” or “Janet”. Oh no - they have legally changed their name to “UberTwitMaster Social Networking Strategist Incorporated”. The invitation on their business card reads like they already know you, and you would be a better person if you became their friend. You try to shout after them as they run past, but they are actually taking no notice of any of the people they are annoying.
Thinking about it, I’m surprised any Churches haven’t tried to “get” social networking. I guess their normal practice won’t work though, will it…
Follow “OurChurchOnHigh”, and don’t you dare follow any other loser/liar Churches - if you don’t follow us, you will burn in hell for all eternity, and great vengeance will be brought down on you, your family, your descendents, and your friends.
It would be pretty entertaining though