This post is by Sherree Worrell. Sherree writes from her point of view on Social Media and tidbits on life Thoughts from the farm. With twenty (20) years’ experience in Office & Business Management, Sherree is preparing to launch her own business to help small business owners with their administrative, business management and social media needs. She can be found on Twitter as @Sherree_W.
Have you noticed a change in your Twitter stream lately? Have you noticed a change in your followers, or tweetchats you might participate in? Have people whom you respect changed?
Does it make you think you might want to change who you’re following and who’s following you? Is it enough to make you think about leaving Twitter altogether?
There are four traits I’m noticing more and more, traits that almost convinced me I should leave Twitter altogether.
1. The Secret Language Phenomenon: This apparently is a by-product of attending a conference. Before the conference, everyone is pleasant, conversations flow easily, there is no pretense and people are genuine.
After the conference, these same people seem like someone else. They talk in a “secret” language, make jokes in that language, and change how they talk with others. It’s almost like they have a “secret handshake” and you’re not invited into their new “club.” Some even stoop to playing people against each other. Really? I’m pretty sure organizers of conferences prefer different take-aways.
Wouldn’t it be more beneficial to share what they learned at that conference so everyone could learn something new? At a minimum, it would help us understand abrupt personality changes.
2. Criticism that’s far from constructive: This is disturbing and it’s happening with alarming frequency. There are people that are so critical of others’ opinions that it has stopped me in my tracks. If a discussion (tweet chat) is open for opinions and the ground rules of the discussion/chat are to encourage healthy debate or input without being hurtful, why do some people insist on being a bully anyway? If I’m expressing my opinion, it is your right not to agree with it, it is not your right to demean me or anyone else …in public. Participating in these discussions is not worth the effort anymore, it’s exhausting. Interestingly, no one will call out the bully – so it continues on.
3. The Soap Box Crowd: These folks feel the need to “soap box” a particular topic to death. They choose to hammer a point over and over because they think they are influential or an authority on that topic. If you look deeper or even challenge them, you find they are not. They love to hear themselves talk and will do anything to be heard, even when it angers people. If you choose to disagree, they keep on it. They want you to change your mind to their way of thinking because they feel they are right. They are entitled to their opinion always; they are not entitled to be a bully. They are arrogant to think they are that influential.
4. The “fame at any price” crowd: Finally, there are the folks who find it necessary to “step on or over” folks in order to be the “big man or woman on campus.” If folks are so insecure they have to steal someone else’s idea, contribution, or even thunder, so they can feel like an “influential” person, do you really want them as a friend? Stepping on/over a person after they have contributed something (such as a product or a recommendation) to claim as their own is underhanded. It’s particularly galling when they do this when a conversation didn’t include them in the first place and they keep doing it – all to look good. Really, it’s no worse than claiming someone’s blog post as your own. If they didn’t come up with the idea or contribution, they shouldn’t take credit for it. If they were honest about where they came upon a product or recommendation, wouldn’t you have more respect for them?
Have you noticed any of these folks in your Twitter stream lately? Have you changed your Twitter habits because of them? Will you?