There are many reasons why I choose to follow people on Twitter. And there are many more reasons why I won’t. I used to auto-follow anyone who followed me, and quickly decided to start being more picky, when my stream was filled with tweets from people that commit the following no-nos:
1. You have no avatar: I want to see who I am talking to. I’m sorry, I just do. Granted, this might not be you, but I feel better about following avatars other than that ugly brown box.
2. You have a naked avatar: Props to you for uploading an avatar! However, last time I checked, Twitter was not an “Adult Friend Finder”. They have sites for that. Go join one and leave us tweeps alone.
3. You have no bio and/or no tweets: You can’t write 160 characters about yourself? Anyone could do that. And why should I follow you if you aren’t tweeting anything? You really shouldn’t start following people until you actually start using Twitter. Try it, it’s fun!
4. YOU TWEET IN ALL CAPS: While the caps button is OK to use SOMETIMES, like when you are trying to excentuate a point, it is not OK to use it for EVERYTHING you say. This is annoying. No one likes being yelled at. My one exception to the rule is @KirstieAlley. She is just too fabulous not to follow.
5. You tweet nothing of value: If every tweet you send is trying to sell me something, I am not interested. I’m sorry, I only follow companies that I like and use or that I think I might need in the future.
6. You tweet me an offer directly: This is not only annoying, but I think it is against Twitter’s Terms of Service. If you think you can bypass me following you to send me something, I will be using the block button. Be warned.
7. You make fun of my love for Dave Matthews: While everyone is entitled to their opinion, being obnoxious about it is not going to get you any points with me. For example, @Rackstar2K pissed me off last week, tweeting not once but 3 times about how stupid I was for being excited to go see DMB in concert. Needless to say, he is now blocked.
8. You post “Get 10k followers by tomorrow!”: I got my followers the hard way, being a fun, awesome person that people want to talk to. I care about my followers and they care about me in return. I cherish the friendships I have made on Twitter and you should too. It’s not about numbers. If you are posting these “get followers” tweets automatically and can’t figure out why, you may want to change your password. Those “Get Followers” sites hijack your account and I bet you are losing more followers than you are gaining.
9. You are a fake celebrity: Do you really think I will believe that you are Leonardo DiCaprio because your name is @LeoDicaprio42? Would Leonardo be following 1,000 people and only have 50 followers? Maybe you can fake out those other tweeps, but not me. My one exception is @Larry_David, whose authenticity is in question. @JGarlin says that it is not him, but how do we know if @JGarlin is really Jeff Garlin and not some 13 year old? *sigh*
10. You lock your updates: Unless you are a celebrity, I think there is no reason to lock your updates. This pretty much goes against everything Twitter stands for. If you don’t want the whole world to know what you are doing, maybe Twitter isn’t for you. If I have to get your permission to see what you are doing, I’m really not that interested.
So there you have it. My Top 10 reasons why I won’t follow you. While I do make exceptions to the rules, I try to stick to these as much as possible. They just make Twitter a better place, for me at least. Happy tweeting!
