Solid Following

I have lately stepped up the frequency of my tweeting, turning over everything funny that would have gone to Facebook over to Twitter. This has payed off, at least in the sense that I typically make a greater impact on any given day than I managed to when I tweeted every here and there instead of a regular seven to ten times a day. The impact has been mostly positive, although it has not exactly resulted in more followers.

I say not exactly because while there have been a lot more followers, they have all been what I would call spam. Spam, like weeds, is all of the ones you don't want. The followers that I don't want on Twitter I block. What's interesting is how they come to me. It's a rather crude system as far as I can tell. As I tweet so often these days, I sooner or later use a word that is being targeted by some business that itself tweets. A recent example would be 'billiards'.

That business sees my profound interest in billiards (and probably susceptibility to their marketing), and starts following me. They must be hoping that I will value a greater number of followers so much that it won't matter to me whether they are actually reading. I happen to care, and so I block anyone who seems to not be a real person with a genuine interest in what I have to say. I think that puts me into a minority category.

This is fine. I have been grateful for most of the times that I have been set aside from most by a decision of mine. I can do without the dubious support of a cigar store that started following me because I mentioned the smoking in 'Rango', though I prefer the cigar store follower to the considerably more dodgy messages directed my way by 'people' who have 900 followers but who have never tweeted. Dodgy though they might be, I'd love to learn their secret. I don't wish to be held under 140 followers forever, principles or not.