Tarique Naseem

Rich Gibson, a fellow twitterer, overheard a conversation between two people. One of them stated that they had stopped using twitter as it made the smart people they knew sound stupid.

I thought it was an interesting point, but never thought much about it at the time. That is until I started to redesign my site. I decided to add a Twitter badge to my main page, displaying my latest tweets. However, within a few minutes of it going live, I clicked through my tweets and shockingly discovered that I did in fact come across as rather dull and sometimes just plain stupid! I have since removed it, you’ll be pleased to know.

This prompted me to analyse a number of tweets, not only from myself, but from my other contacts and, although it’s a great way to keep abreast of what they are thinking or doing, the banality of the majority of the posts is quite evident! In fact, one member of my family, who shall remain nameless, frequently twitters about being bored. I mean, how dull do you want to get?

My tweets are generally for the consumption of friends and family and, as I have a reputation for blurting out anything that enters my deranged mind, it’s a great way of playing to my audience, and good fun to boot! And that’s part of the problem; it’s like thinking aloud, and can become a little self-indulgent at times. As soon as something you deem to be interesting happens, you grab your phone and type away, with little thought about any consequences of what you’re saying. It’s far too easy and addictive.

However, as I have now acquired new followers, some of whom are business contacts, it’s forcing me to actually think before I twitter, in case I really do say something stupid! As such, some of my tweets are now work related (yawn), ironically making me sound even duller than before.

It makes you wonder though how your use of Twitter might affect your reputation with your contacts who barely know you. In fact, I wonder what opinion they have of me already? A worrying thought :)

If you really must, my twitter page is here.

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