Yesterday morning, several people I really enjoy following on Twitter (Diarmuid Fogarty, Gavin Dudeney, and Victoria Boobyer) decided to throw in the towel and deactivate their Twitter accounts.
I was surprised and a little saddened by this, as although I'm sure they have their reasons for abandoning Twitter, deactivating your account is a very drastic step from which (to the best of my knowledge) there is no going back, as once you have pushed the button it sets the wheels in motion for your account to be deleted.
For the benefit of those who perhaps may be feeling a tad overwhelmed by the relentless flow of information being pumped into the Twitterstream, here are a few alternative suggestions to pulling the plug permanently, if you are starting to feel that Twitter has been getting a bit too much lately and it is interfering with your work flow, stopping you getting things done, etc...
1) Take a Twitter Sabbatical
Tweet that you are planning to take a break from Twitter, and stick to it until you feel like returning. DM anybody who @messages you that you want to keep in touch with instead of Tweeting publicly for a while.
2) Use Twitter Lists
Choose a small number of people (say 20-50) who you connect with regularly on Twitter and who tweet great stuff, and add them to a Twitter list. Keep that list open to follow what they are tweeting about and ignore everyone else. Put out a general message once a week or so to thank other people for @ messaging you or retweeting you, rather than thanking them individually.
3) Bulk Unfollowing
Unfollow people who don't add value to your Twitter experience, and focus on to following those who do instead.
4) Become a Twitter Recluse
Follow these three easy steps to go into hiding on Twitter, and keep your options open to return at some future point if you wish to do so:
Step 1
Remove yourself from any Twitter lists that you've been added to. You will need to block and unfollow anybody who has put you on a Twitter list in order to achieve this (you can always re-follow them once you have removed yourself from their list, if you like).
Step 2
Change your user name, profile picture, Twitter profile, and any other information that might give the game away.
Step 3
Tweet 20 or so things that are unrelated to the kind of stuff you usually tweet, so that all the things you tweeted about under your old identity are pushed off your twitter page.
Congratulations! You have just cloaked your Twitter identity and are now in full-on stealth mode... should anybody search for you under your old name, they will be directed to a "Sorry, that page doesn't exist" message.
If you ever wish to stage a comeback, simply reinstate your old Twitter handle, photo and profile, and act like you have never been away ;-D
Footnote:
I'm busy finalising my talk for IATEFL Brighton about how to keep your lesson on track if the technology breaks down, so I'm following my own advice and will be mostly just lurking on Twitter rather than posting till it's done... just send me a DM if you need to grab my attention :-)
Sue
I was surprised and a little saddened by this, as although I'm sure they have their reasons for abandoning Twitter, deactivating your account is a very drastic step from which (to the best of my knowledge) there is no going back, as once you have pushed the button it sets the wheels in motion for your account to be deleted.
For the benefit of those who perhaps may be feeling a tad overwhelmed by the relentless flow of information being pumped into the Twitterstream, here are a few alternative suggestions to pulling the plug permanently, if you are starting to feel that Twitter has been getting a bit too much lately and it is interfering with your work flow, stopping you getting things done, etc...
1) Take a Twitter Sabbatical
Tweet that you are planning to take a break from Twitter, and stick to it until you feel like returning. DM anybody who @messages you that you want to keep in touch with instead of Tweeting publicly for a while.
2) Use Twitter Lists
Choose a small number of people (say 20-50) who you connect with regularly on Twitter and who tweet great stuff, and add them to a Twitter list. Keep that list open to follow what they are tweeting about and ignore everyone else. Put out a general message once a week or so to thank other people for @ messaging you or retweeting you, rather than thanking them individually.
3) Bulk Unfollowing
Unfollow people who don't add value to your Twitter experience, and focus on to following those who do instead.
4) Become a Twitter Recluse
Follow these three easy steps to go into hiding on Twitter, and keep your options open to return at some future point if you wish to do so:
Step 1
Remove yourself from any Twitter lists that you've been added to. You will need to block and unfollow anybody who has put you on a Twitter list in order to achieve this (you can always re-follow them once you have removed yourself from their list, if you like).
Step 2
Change your user name, profile picture, Twitter profile, and any other information that might give the game away.
Step 3
Tweet 20 or so things that are unrelated to the kind of stuff you usually tweet, so that all the things you tweeted about under your old identity are pushed off your twitter page.
Congratulations! You have just cloaked your Twitter identity and are now in full-on stealth mode... should anybody search for you under your old name, they will be directed to a "Sorry, that page doesn't exist" message.
If you ever wish to stage a comeback, simply reinstate your old Twitter handle, photo and profile, and act like you have never been away ;-D
Footnote:
I'm busy finalising my talk for IATEFL Brighton about how to keep your lesson on track if the technology breaks down, so I'm following my own advice and will be mostly just lurking on Twitter rather than posting till it's done... just send me a DM if you need to grab my attention :-)
Sue
13 comments:
GREAT POST!
Constructive and with a ton of good ideas for folks who feel a bit of the "information overload" or are just need a twitter hiatus.
will retweet :)
Sounds like a suicide pact...
But great to read your pointers, Sue.
Just in case we get the same affliction! :-)
Marisa
Sue,
No cry for help on my part, I have to say. I'm just bored with the relentless vacuity of much of Twitter (and yes, I know there's some good stuff too!) and want to get on with some more constructive work for a while...
Gavin
How about just setting a timer for yourself and signing off at the designated time you've set, acknowledging the need to take care of other things in your life as well. Another thing I've had to do is avoid getting on Twitter an hour or two before going to bed. It actually was keeping me from sleeping well--all the excitement of that new info kept swirling through my head all night!
Thank you for stopping by & commenting, everyone; much appreciated.
I've spoken to a lot of people recently who have been cutting back on Twitter and I've scaled down my presence on there a bit recently, too... I've been experimenting with ways to get more work done and just thought I'd share a few ideas which others might find useful :-)
Thanks for the suggestions, Rita - I sometimes use a timer myself, (Lindsay Clandfield put me onto it!) though I must admit I don't always pay attention to it when it goes off ;-)
Sue
Great post, Sue! Thanks for the sound advice. I'm aware I sometimes get distracted by the excellent stuff I come across in Twitter and find it hard to scale down my presence. What I do when I'm busy is I mark a tweet I find helpful as favourite and when I have free time, I go back to the tweets I had marked as favourite. I also recognise I don't read books as much as I used to before entering the Twitterverse. However, after weighing the pros and cons, I'm sure it offers more benefits than drawbacks for professional development and improvement of my teaching practice.
Hugs from Argentina!
Marisa
Hello there Sue,
A helpful post. It's always good to offer people alternatives and give information.
I guess it's a personal thing and depends on how and why you leave. I tried to leave in a courteous way which showed my PLN and followers the very great respect they deserve. I gave a couple of days notice and gave my email by DM to anyone who asked.
I don't see it as a cry for help but rather a change of how I organize my time. I have lots of new things going on in my life and simply wasn't disciplined enough to time myself on twitter or have a 'holiday' without having a peek etc.. I have, however, now subscribed to those selected blogs I find help me develop as a teacher.
We all get (or got) different things from twitter. I hope everyone else there continues to have a blinking ball.
In the end, though, it's not a suicide. It's simply leaving a social networking and microblogging website. They are poles apart.
For the record, there was no 'suicide pact'. I only found out that Diarmuid Fogarty and Gavin Dudeney had left way after everyone on twitter did, I suspect. I'd already left, see? ;-)
Again, a grand post.
See you about...especially seeing as this is one of the additional blogs I can follow with my extra time!
Victoria
Thanks for stopping by, Vic :-)
Missed your long goodbye as I was at ISTEK over the weekend, and I don't really do Twitter when I'm away at conferences.
This post had been brewing for a while really as I've been cutting back on Twitter a bit myself lately... this week's exits, stage left just helped kick it into being.
As you say, deleting your Twitter account is poles apart from suicide, but I've spoken to a few people who struggle to manage their time on there so I thought I'd blog a few ideas in the hope that they might help.
See you around the blogosphere :-)
Sue
Hi Marisa,
Favouriting tweets is a great idea - thanks for the suggestion!
I tend to agree that the benefits outweigh the drawbacks as well, as long as you don't let it interfere with all the other things you have to do...
Sue :-)
Hi Sue!
I have also limited my Twitter presence to be able to concentrate on my work more fully. I also favourite tweets for later reading and it seems to work.
Vicky =)
Hi Vicky, & thanks for stopping by!
I've also started favouriting tweets and it seems to be working for me as well..
This week I'm doing my best to stick to option 1, though no doubt I'll probably crack before too long :-)
Sue
Nice ideas!
Thanks for sharing. I had a twitter account and just kind of ignored it until recently - I only just now feel that I am starting to connect with people and use it effectively. These are great for anyone who wants to ease into using this great tool!
Great post, I've also done a lot of things you,ve suggested. I find my lists really useful - in fact found this post by looking through my UK ESOL list. But should probably go to bed now!
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