Twittering

Of all the social networking websites that we are either cursed or blessed (delete as applicable) with, Twitter is by far the most loathed. Even people who haven’t the faintest idea what it actually is despise it out of some sort of deep-held innate principle. Twitter is somehow symptomatic of all that’s wrong with the modern world; it’s inane, puerile, vacuous, the very worst sort of self-indulgent navel-gazing imaginable. These comments are 99.9% accurate.

The basic premise is this: you, the Twitterer, Tweeter, Tw*t, have 140 characters to write whatever you like (the same number of characters as contained in a text message). This message can then be read by your ‘followers’ on their computers or smartphones, and replied to, commented upon, or noted and then completely ignored.

. Have a guess which is the most prevalent. Yes, it’s ‘pointless babble’, representing over 40% of Twitter’s content. The internet, chock-full of meaningless, pointless babble? Tell me something I don’t know.

So far, so what? Many users familiar with other social networking sites such as MySpace or Facebook approach Twitter with puzzlement. The most common complaint being isn’t Twitter simply the Facebook status update facility, and nothing else? Well yes, that’s exactly what it is. But with Twitter you don’t need to apply to befriend anybody, you just locate the person you’re interested in (provided they’re signed-up), click ‘follow’, and hey presto. That person’s every waking thought and deed is a mere touch of a button away.

Still not getting it? Here’s the magic fairy dust; the secret of its success: loads of celebrities use Twitter.

Celebrities like it because they can communicate with their devoted minions directly, without having to negotiate through the shark-infested pages of Heat, Closer or the tabs. And this unadulterated, direct communion becomes addictive as the celebs watch their follower numbers rise. Because the numbers can be spectacular. Stephen Fry, very nice man that he undoubtedly is, boasts a remarkable one-and-a-half-million followers on Twitter. Thus if Stephen Fry enjoys a particularly delicious breakfast and deigns to type out 140 characters on its scrumptiousness, over a million rapt followers read about this immediately, and have the ability to comment, if they should so wish, upon their own breakfasts. Lily Allen has over two million followers. Sarah Brown (wife of Gordon) 1.2 mil. Jordan a mere 532,000. I confess that I too use Twitter. And I have 80 (count ‘em) whole followers of my own. I use Twitter to keep track of friends, the news, sport, my own cultural spheres of interest and my own special selected cabal of celebrities. I follow Richard Madeley, for example. I don’t know why. I know it’s sad; it’s pathetic; it’s risible; but I follow Richard Madeley on Twitter, and yes, I spend some of my day – every day – reading about what Richard Madeley is doing. Religiously.

So were we to ask the question what is Twitter for? we might conclude that the answer is to further anoint the notion of celebrity; to babble pointlessly; to bear witness to the pointless babble of celebrity. Let me check what Richard Madeley is doing right this minute. Hold on. Here we go: he’s cooking a roast dinner. How fascinating. I wonder what he’ll do next? Blink. Amen.

www.twitter.com/sebhunter

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