Things 10 and 11: Twitter & Facebook Part 1

I created a Twitter account several years ago to see what all the fuss was about but never had a mad rush of enthusiasm for it and left it to fend for itself. I also have a Facebook account that I use a lot - it's such an easy way of sharing news and photos with friends and family who don't live locally.

At the moment my perception is that Facebook is a great way of communicating with genuine friends that encourages interaction, whereas Twitter is less personal and therefore, to me, less satisfying. I know that many people love Twitter and use it in different ways, from keeping up to date with sports news (#notme), following celebrities and posting cat pictures. We're not even halfway through the week yet so I'm posting this to express my current view - I wonder if it will have changed by the end of the week when we have all engaged fully with the Twitter task.

I was surprised that the official Twitter how to get started guide emphasises that the real value of Twitter is in reading information, not contributing information:

I like the help and support information, it seems to be pitched at exactly the right level - useful without making the reader feel stupid. In fact, at the moment I'd say the help guide is the thing I like best about Twitter...along with the noise it makes in the iPad app when you pull down the screen to refresh it.

...It's now Friday and I've been trying to engage with Twitter. I will post again in a few days with my reflections, but wanted to add that I am affronted Twitter seems so surprised whenever someone replies to one of my tweets. This is from the notification email:

Is that exclamation mark necessary? Huh.