On Twitter
The anti-Twitter backlash is happening, followed closely by a wave of Twitter-ridicule.
I like Twitter for several reasons, including the fact that I can choose to follow or un-follow whomever and whenever – spam does not exist in this dojo.
The 140-character limit enforces a kind of pithy “cleverness” – a potential drawback. That is to say, choose your follows carefully, and don’t hesitate to weed out the poseurs. In the end, though, your Twitter feed is likely to look something like the high school “quote of the day” lists, where you keep a running list of out-of-context utterances. “That mayonnaise sandwich would make a good flip-flop.” Ha ha ha!
Whether you’re a Twitter-hater or -lover or -indifferent, you’ll enjoy a new meta-Twitter comedy blog called “Keith Starky Explains Twitter”. Written by a “leading researcher in the field of Advanced Sparse-Tree Social Networking Systems,” the blog is “part of his ongoing research in humor propagation and fluid reputation dynamics.” In it, he “explains” selected tweets, one at a time.
The central conceit of the “tweet” in this case is the idea that Ninjas, which are black-clad martial artists who employ tactics of stealth to both defeat their opponents and avoid waking people up at night when they go to the bathroom, could partake in some of the worldly pleasures of the non-Ninja world (e.g., crunchy snacks) if that non-Ninja world consisted entirely of people wearing noise-canceling headphones3. Henceforth we refer to this world as Headphone-World.
Also worth reading: McSweeney’s Understanding Twitter.
Twitter seems to be, first and foremost, an online haven where teenagers making drugs can telegraph secret code words to arrange gang fights and orgies… In order to become a “follower” on Twitter, teens first must flash their high-beam headlights at an oncoming motorist on the highway. Then, if that motorist flashes his or her high-beam headlights back in reply, the teen must kill the motorist in order to be initiated into “following” the online gang.
