Here, here! As I commented on @micala’s blog, twitter is a conversation for me – and the arbitrary rule-making gets to me.

As an introvert, I can understand how somebody could go into overwhelm with twitter at times, and I understand that overwhelm may be why people are setting up their “rules”, but that’s when you close your client and walk away (or filter them as you said).

Sorry, got a typo in the link to @adamstahr twitter profile

Nikki,

If you don’t get overwhelmed by the barrage more power to you! But after trying the ‘pile it on’ approach and finding myself deluged and at times not able to give quality input because of it, I opted to prune my networks to what I could tolerate and where I could make the greatest contribution.

Nikki,

As I said on Twitter, thanks for the techniques, but what about the philosophical aspect of this question – i.e following folks, yet not really following them? Don’t we all have a physical/human limit with the communications our brains can handle (since we’re not computers yet)?

You know, I’m actually one of those people who was a ‘rule’ setter in twitter. I was telling myself I would follow no more than 100 people – but precisely for the reason that I wanted to be able to pay close attention and have that conversation and really feel like I was connecting with people. I tried hard to stay within those limits, but found it was just impossible. There are too many people out there with so many amazing things to say that only following 100 just wouldn’t work. I will say that I do *not* arbitrarily just follow people back if they follow me. I do look at their twitter feed and profile and try to make a decision on whether or not to follow back. If they’re following thousands, my chances of following back are slim. I still do think, though, that the conversation is what’s important to me. I think there just comes a point where it will be too much. Tweetdeck’s great because it allows you to separate things out, and I know I can just respond to replies and DM’s, but that’s not the same. It’s not the same as keeping up with little details and bits of information that people might share that could easily get lost in a stream of thousands of followers. It’s a fine line for me.. I’m still working out how to handle it.

You’ve hit the nail on the head here. Twitter, for me, isn’t the same as it is for others. Probably because I just don’t have the time to devote to it as others seem to and I don’t find it as valuable as they do.

I will intentionally block people who aren’t ‘real’ or seem to be some variety of spam. When it comes to other social networks, I’m not quite as discerning. LinkedIn, I’m fine with adding pretty much anyone who seeks to add me, though I don’t go out of my way to grow my network.

On Facebook, it’s generally limited to people I’ve met in real life, though there are some exceptions for people I know online and have communicated with.

I’d like the networking to be a conversation, so taking on more folks than I can handle does everyone a disservice, I think.

I definitely fall on the side of trying to follow more people. Like Stewart said, there is a decent balance of people who Twitter a lot vs. a little – if everyone I followed was Chris Brogan, then I definitely couldn’t handle it! And I don’t think it’s cheating to follow someone, but not be super aware of them. When someone follows me, I don’t expect them to catch every single tweet of mine, and reply back instantly. I just hope that if they happen to read something they connect with, that they’ll respond and say hi or offer their thoughts. If not, no big deal.

witter is about conversation and engagement. There is no one size fits all, no magic number to follow, no single best app to handle twitter. In fact, I maintain that your personal answer can–and will–change as your situation changes.

I don’t separate work and personal tweets and personas. I figure my identity is a combination of both, so my tweets will be too. I expect that if this isn’t suitable to you, then you will be responsible for deleting me from your feed. Personally, I like having the “whole picture” of a twitter peep, and find them MUCH more interesting and engaging. Likewise, I follow an 80-20 rule: I use TweetDeck and tend to follow everyone 80% of the time. I don’t always engage, and I try not to obsess, but I stay vaguely aware of what’s going on with my twittersphere. That being said, there are times that my twitter feed and my workload are not compatible, and I need to drop the conversation noise. When this happens (about 20% of the time) I reduce to a group of local peeps because they are working and engaged on the things I am working on as well. I don’t like staying at the reduced level all the time, because I find great value added input from the greater circle (I mean, honestly, from @fienen in Kansas, @kevinoshea and @davideisert at Purdue, @markgr in Buffalo, my twitterstream is an expansive and effective network of people I would never have otherwise “met”). So to me, I obviously find value in a range of voices in my twitterstream. Like@karinejoly, I always respond to @robin2go questions or comments, because I want to encourage the dialog. And if you follow me, I will look at your profile and, more often than not, follow you back if your tweets and background seem like they would be a good addition to my network.

My selection of twitterers is much like real life. I have some who are peeps I work with at Penn State. Some are design people; others are education geeks. Still others are librarians. Some peeps are even virtual drinking buddies. So be it. Again, I find that each group has value, many often overlap, and most of them are valued for the particular input they offer. Some are infrequent until there is an event or a topic for them to tweet about; this is important, because that is particularly when I want to hear from them.

But what about the loudest voices? Well, either they’re for you, or against you, as they say. We all know the twitterfeed can become raucous, rebellious, and ridiculously loud at times. Conversations happen. Networking happens. Go to a party and listen to the conversation. As in Twitter, you will probably hear my voice bouncing above the normal level of conversation. I find that I value these voices if they are engaged in dialogue I find interesting or relevant. Too much so? Then I find ways of lessening the noise. Sometimes it means walking to the other side of the room for a while (twittersnooze, twuffer), and sometimes it means disengaging that voice from your focus (unfollow).

Let’s consider, for a moment, the number of presentations and talks I’ve done to promote microblogging–specifically, Twitter. Four times within the last year alone, I’ve done events where we’ve created a backchannel and encouraged people to sign up and get involved. These are noobs; some of them never get back into the conversation, but I’ve had more than I have expected stay tuned in and participate. They make their way up the Twitter Curve and are engaged in the twittersphere. I think of Mark Greenfield’s explanation that you need the alpha user to encourage the new participants; I consider myself an alpha user with a responsibility to those I have introduced to Twitter to be there if they try to engage… or reengage… or reengage yet again. If they aren’t saying much, then there’s no real need to delete them from my twittersphere. In fact, I find that I am more likely to remove someone from my twitter stream if I discover they are prolific twitterers but not relevant to my needs or interests.

So in reality, was does this mean? It means there are no real rules. You should be tweaking your network the way it best works for you. Believe me, if someone doesn’t like your input (or doesn’t like the fact you don’t offer input), they should unfollow you in order to maintain their own network as it works for them.

Thanks Nikki, for replying to comments. Good follow-up! Yes, you’re right, sometimes an @reply is half of something useful/worthwhile. I do always check.

I sense from several comments that some are trying to keep up with everything that happens in Twitter. That is, to connect with the various conversational streams and stay with them to get it all from those they follow. That definitely would require keeping the number manageable.

For me, after about 5 months of getting increasingly active on Twitter, it’s Chris Brogan’s river analogy. You don’t DRINK the river, you drink FROM the river.

When I have time, I take a look at what’s flowing by, see if there are conversations I want to engage in where I can add value, post links to a couple of things I’ve read lately, look at the @ conversations of others & maybe jump in. My settings show people who aren’t in my network who are getting an @ from someone I follow–that’s how I find some of the greatest people to follow. I look at new followers’ profiles & tweetstream, as do several who commented here, and follow selectively where I see value. I don’t expect it to be two-way value perception every time.

This is not at all systematic, obviously. But I find that Twitter has SO much to offer–new ideas from smart people every day, as someone I follow tweeted just the other day (wish I could remember who)–that I clearly can’t get it all.

And this system HAS worked to build a sense of community and connection with those who are on regularly, tweeting things of value. I count on @ messages for sustained conversations.

I tried setting up Tweetdeck & gave up pretty quickly. I have a wide variety of interests and am following people in all of them, but some of them share several of the same interests. So if I put someone into the Cycling column, the Public Policy/Gov 2.0 column, and the Social Media Column, I see the same tweet 3 times.

That’s less efficient for me than just sipping from the river when I can, and I’m pretty serendipitous in how I process info & ideas–I’d rather bounce all over the place than drill down forever in one spot, and Twitter is GREAT for that.

I ended up defining a social media follow policy & posting it on my personal blog so people would understand when I don’t follow them back, friend on Facebook & so forth. I have different standards & comfort levels in different spaces, which is where my personal limits come in rather than an arbitrary number. (Policy for the curious: http://biketoworkbarb.blogspot.com/2009/01/tweeting-twittering-friending-following.html)

@BarbChamberlain

“Allow your network to grow organically based on people of interest whom you find or who find you.”

Excellent point! I will admit that when I first started engaging on the social networks that I was a ridiculously strict rule follower, now 6 months in I’m learning the error in that. Live and learn I suppose now it’s just a matter of trimming and cleaning up the various sites with an eye towards relevancy instead of the almighty numbers.