Twitter is fucking retarded
So I played with it for a while. Cracked jokes. Followed famous people. Followed not-so-famous people. Geolocated myself. Posted pictures via twitpic or douchetweet or fuckchirp or whatever lamprey-like fly-by-night jackass service reared up to add the moronic and superfluous features that the folks at Twitter were smart enough to originally eschew.
And my verdict is: It’s retarded. It’s AOL keywords.
It’s the CB radio of the 2000’s.
For all the connectivity Twitter supposedly offers, it offers no genuine connections at all. Everything is passive. You send out a “tweet”1 into the universe with no idea or clue that anyone will answer. You have no idea if anyone heard you. You have no indication that anyone cares. It’s just a firehose of the pointless flotsam and jetsam of cultural minutia and lifestyle effluvium, delivered in a lightly distracting, OM NOM NOM-style all-you-can-eat infotainment/ego-casting stream to whatever millennial-enabled wireless device you’re willing to hook into it2.
It’s like talking to yourself, out loud, on the bus. And it offers just about the same amount of useful feedback.
If Twitter is the future of online communication, or the future of blogging and/or journalism: I’m out. I want the communication I spend my ever-decreasing amount of free time on to be richer, clearer; not constrained by arbitrary limitations based on the maximum length of SMS text messages.
1 I never thought I’d hate a single word more than the word ‘blog,’ but here we are.
2 Also see: Facebook.
December 15th, 2008 at 10:33 pm
December 18th, 2008 at 11:49 pm
February 25th, 2009 at 11:08 am
January 13th, 2009 at 5:53 pm
February 25th, 2009 at 11:08 am
March 6th, 2009 at 4:54 pm
June 3rd, 2009 at 5:12 pm
November 12th, 2008 at 6:36 pm
But on the plus side, it’s like talking to yourself, out loud, on the bus.
‘Cos frankly, the downfall of the blog is the FEEDBACK.
November 12th, 2008 at 6:40 pm
So, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so true.
The Rise and Fall of Comment Culture is its own cranky essay, but I think we’re going to see fewer and fewer sites turning on comments as time marches on; or if they do accept comments, switching to a fully moderated model where every comment is checked by a Real Live Person.
There’s really something to John Gabriel’s Greater Internet Fuckwad Theory.
November 24th, 2008 at 9:20 am
FYI, twitterfree.com is available for the taking.
December 3rd, 2008 at 11:08 am
Hahaha. I love this post. Glad to see you haven’t left the Twitterverse yet!
December 4th, 2008 at 1:43 pm
LMFAO!!! this is EXACTLY how i feel about twitter. great post.
December 6th, 2008 at 11:08 am
This reflects what I’ve said for a long time:
The only folks who use twitter are utter Twits.
December 6th, 2008 at 11:13 am
But why, WHY, pray tell, does the Fail Whale look so happy?
December 6th, 2008 at 12:40 pm
In your point about talking to yourself out loud on a bus: how is blogging any different? You don’t know that anyone will comment for sure, you don’t know if anyone is even going to read it. In order to be effective with any online medium you have to be immersed in the culture to some extent. If you have friends who are cool on twitter then you’ll have a good experience. The problem is when people forget that just posting “I’m taking a shower” isn’t interesting to read. You have to have a descent amount of wit to make your day interesting by tweeting those small details in a way that makes people want to read them. It’s just like blogging, only more personal. Sorry man – I don’t think you have any valid points here once you get past the shock value and witty sarcasm- but it was still interesting to read because of those two elements….do I have a point?
December 7th, 2008 at 8:36 am
I have enough room here on the blog to make a cogent argument. On Twitter, I’m forced to write like Winston Churchill and make everything I post like some sort of micro-witty bon mot. Plus, we can see all the discussion on my post on one page without flipping through other people’s (ugly ass) Twitter pages.
My point is that it’s not viable for what it’s being used for. It’s viable for “I AM WASHING THE DISHES” or “THIS SOUP IS GREAT” but for back and forth discussion or exploration of a larger point, it falls down fast and hard.
December 13th, 2008 at 1:33 am
I decided to give Twitter a try for a little while, but it remains to be seen how it goes. I agree that the disconnected nature of responses is kind of off-putting (Facebook seems a lot better in that respect). I’m hoping that some of the twitter clients out there help on that aspect of things.
I tended to be overly verbose back when I had a blog (and even now I spend too much time polishing e-mail messages), so maybe this will help me get more to the point. ;)
February 22nd, 2009 at 5:43 am
hook up with some friends on there, and watch.
also, use the search feature to grab an rss feed of something that interests you.
signed,
–former twithater
March 3rd, 2009 at 5:05 pm
I never got into these social networking sites. I don’t need to know what everyone is doing every second of their lives. In fact I think a little mystery is good. If I want to talk to a friend I’ll call them on the phone or take a drive to their house.
March 27th, 2009 at 10:02 am
i think you missed the point of twitter
March 27th, 2009 at 11:41 pm
Twitter is soooooooooooooooooo lame…
Who cares what you’re doing every minute of the day!?
Seriously..
April 1st, 2009 at 5:30 am
This all started with Myspace. I think that these sites are popular because they feed people’s egos. We’re breeding a nation of self-important narcissistic asshats who think everybody should care how they feel or know what they’re doing 24/7. I had a few friends I used to respect until I saw them posting several times a day with little updates on what they’re doing every second.. we’re talking guys that are 30+. So lame and gay.
April 15th, 2009 at 1:04 pm
Great post! Douchetweet and Fuckchirp are two of the funniest things I’ve heard in a long time.
April 17th, 2009 at 11:34 am
LOL. Great writeup.
April 25th, 2009 at 1:25 am
I totally agree with “Twittersucks” with his/her comments above on April 1st. LOL
April 27th, 2009 at 1:56 pm
I couldn’t agree more!
I too thought the blog thing was awful, until the media and our esteemed congressmen started “tweeting”. *holds back vomit*
May 6th, 2009 at 4:44 am
I can’t stand any of the sites like this. I feel like I’m dragged into them by douche friends who don’t quit asking if I’m on the Twit or the Space or Book or whatever until I sign up.
The one thing that I’ve heard that may prove to be useful for journalists is them posting the links to their newest articles on twitter. But I don’t see how this is any different than an RSS feed. Less useful in fact.
May 13th, 2009 at 6:17 pm
So tru I dont even have one but It looks really stupid and if its anything like talking to yourself on a bus outloud then I really don’t want to be bothered.
May 29th, 2009 at 1:11 pm
fuckchirp, lol! I tried it myself back around the time you made this post, I dropped about 5 or 6 “tweets” and left, I just don’t get it.
May 29th, 2009 at 11:06 pm
I’m so glad to discover i’m not the only one who thinks this way about twitter.
I dont get it either. Who honestly thinks everyone needs to hear what they have to say???
Social networking websites in general are going down the crapper…
facebook is accumulating a sizable collection of utterly pointless “groups” and “fan clubs”
and dont fucking get me started on the like feature they added…
another way for people to act like they are communicating with others while not actually doing so
i have frowned upon blogging in general because, for the most part, it does create total fuckwads who have no sense of how annoying they really are
i dont even like to talk about blogging
makes me feel disgusted at the human race
in fact, just saying blog outloud makes me wanna hurl… *groan* :-X
May 31st, 2009 at 4:59 pm
I tried it. It sucks. I just don’t get it. What’s the point? I could not get why everyone is so into the whole thing. Boooooooooooooring.
June 12th, 2009 at 4:22 am
All my life a twit was someone who was stupid, possibly retarded. Hey you twit. So they got together and started twitter. I think twitter was created in a board room somewhere in MSNBCBSOXNN land somewhere. Go Detroit Red Wings!
June 15th, 2009 at 7:54 pm
People who use Twitter need psychiatric help.
June 17th, 2009 at 1:02 am
Twitter is boring and makes no sense, I made an account and skip the password stealing step, and in less than 10 mins I had followers that resulted to be one of those prostitution networks or something, the one that knows the city where you live in.
Then I followed some celebrities, wich you can never know if they are for real, and by the way they’re soo boring, probably they pay someone to act like them lol.
Their web is terribly designed and looks as if they did it on a hurry. I don’t know why but i feel like their only objective is to steal user passwords.
The people that uses Twitter probably doesn’t have much experience with computers or Internet and they just use it becase they heard on the tv that it is the greatest thing. All those “Social networking” sites have a very dark future and they only exist thanks to all that publicity that comes from… who knows?
Someday not too far, people are going to get tired of all those emerging, time consuming social networks and only the best of them will survive.
June 17th, 2009 at 12:28 pm
I always thought Twitter was created for celebrities. I just heard about the site this year, and heard no one but celebrity names being dropped to market it. I haven’t yet met anyone who twasms….it’s gotta be a marketing ploy that for some reason, people are following.
June 17th, 2009 at 11:01 pm
If you want to hear about what someone is up to, wouldn’t it make more sense to call and ask? Instead of wasting so much time texting/IMing/Twittering you could actually speak to someone and have a meaningful conversation.
June 19th, 2009 at 2:35 am
Twitter is stupid and pointless. That is all that needs to be said!
June 19th, 2009 at 3:41 am
I want to know what everyone typed into Google to find this post. I searched for “fucking twitter”.
I agree with whoever said “fuckchirp” and “douchetweet” are hilarious. =D
June 19th, 2009 at 11:48 am
After using dictionary.com to read this article, I found it to be very funny and true!
Good job!
June 19th, 2009 at 11:54 am
P.S. – I typed “Twitter is retarded” into Google Search to find this article.
June 19th, 2009 at 10:17 pm
I typed twitter sucks in google
June 20th, 2009 at 5:00 pm
twitter is fucking retarded
June 27th, 2009 at 12:17 pm
fucking lame. this is as hyped as the segway. Twitter will only survive because of the uneducated dumbasses out there.
June 30th, 2009 at 7:54 pm
hey cbs are still fucking awsome do know what u are thinking of there
June 30th, 2009 at 7:55 pm
hey cbs are still fucking awsome dont know what u are thinking of there
July 1st, 2009 at 2:24 am
“Are CBS awesome, Mommy?”
“It sure are, Timmy. It suuuure are.”
July 2nd, 2009 at 8:37 pm
Twitter is a nice slice of fucking stupid
CBS is a nice slice of shitty programming
and Tweet is, by far the worst fake word ever.
July 4th, 2009 at 6:07 am
I love how all of the non technical marketing retards I run into carry on about Twitter like its the second coming of Christ. They tell me how so n so tweeted this or that…and I’m thinking, who gives a flying fuck.
Realy though, TWeet this: Twitter is for posers…GG