Tuesday, April 6, 2010

What is twitter spam? My little survey.

I'm not sure I have an answer to this, and I'm wondering what other people feel.

To me it seems that the following are "spammy" conduct on Twitter:

1. "Following" people not because you are interested in them, but because you are trying to increase your number of "followers".

2. Addressing unsolicited tweets to people you don't know because you want them to retweet something or to visit some site.

3. Sending unsolicited DM's to people you don't know because you want them to retweet something, or to visit some site.

I would appreciate your opinions as to whether you agree with the above, or whether there are other things you would consider spam.

(A short URL for this post: http://is.gd/bh6Iy )

2 comments:

  1. I pretty much agree with this post. One good thing about Twitter is it's sort of hard for an unsolicited DM to happen, since you have to be following someone yourself for them to be able to DM you.

    One other behavior on Twitter I find spammy and aggravating is when an external app attempts to post a stock message of some sort to your Twitter when you use it, not always with ample warning or the ability to opt out. Certain backup apps do this, after you grant them access to your account for the intended use you find the app posting something along the lines of "I just backed up my Tweets with blah blah blah!" to your Twitter.

    ReplyDelete
  2. I am not sure if #1 qualifies, but I agree with the other points. Excessive redundancy feels spammy to me.

    ReplyDelete

I have a few simple comment rules:

(a) No

1. rudeness
2. falsehood
3. deception
4. unfair tactics
5. comment spam
6. shilling or trolling

(b) stay on topic, and

(c) if you're anonymous, use a handle so we can distinguish you from other anonymous commenters.

Thanks for commenting.

Ray