The reason for my popping into Shel's comment to Guy was that I agreed with Shel about the annoyance factor from the inordinate number of tweets (oh lord i hate that word) Guy posts that are nothing more than links to mainstream news stories on Guy's business site, Truemors.
A typical Guy Kawasaki tweet? Cat Returns After 7 Years http://tinyurl.com/2598kh
shelisrael @guykawasaki Just once, I'd like to follow a url from you that did not take me to Truemors. 03:39 PM December 27, 2007 from web in reply to guykawasaki 
guykawasaki @ shelisrael Why? Are they not interesting? Here's one for you then: http://urlthat.com/62244f3 10:01 PM December 27, 2007 from twhirl in reply to shelisrael shelisrael @guykawasaki That was diverse, but my baby is 35. I just wish you would converse more & promote less. It would put me more on Truemor's side guykawasaki @shelisrael What if I don't feel like conversing? Is it a requirement to bare my soul with every tweet? 10:21 PM December 27, 2007 from twhirl in reply to shelisrael 
jeneane @guykawasaki no, but it is a requirement that you not link-spam on twitter. 01:24 AM December 28, 2007 from web in reply to guykawasaki 
guykawasaki @jeneane What is the definition of link spam? Why not just not follow me? 10:28 PM December 27, 2007 from twhirl in reply to jeneane jeneane @guykawasaki I want to follow you, not truemors. Why not start a twitter ID for truemors. 01:31 AM December 28, 2007 from web in reply to guykawasaki guykawasaki @jeneane Actually, there is one. It has all the Truemors in it. Here's the thing: my feed is the 3rd-4th best source. It "works" 10:34 PM December 27, 2007 from twhirl in reply to jeneane jeneane @guykawasaki OH you DO have a Truemors twitter account. So why double duty the links? 01:33 AM December 28, 2007 from web in reply to guykawasaki guykawasaki @jeneane 2736 people follow me. About 300 follow Truemors. What would you do? 10:37 PM December 27, 2007 from twhirl in reply to jeneane jeneane @guykawasaki maybe tinyurl's the problem. if I KNEW you were doing a Truemors link for the 20th time, I'd skip it and just read YOUR stuff. 01:38 AM December 28, 2007 from web in reply to guykawasaki guykawasaki @jeneane Then you can skip anything that comes in via Twitterfeed. All of those are truemors. 10:41 PM December 27, 2007 from twhirl in reply to jeneane jeneane @guykawasaki thanks for the tip. still it's your face, with peas. Could you add some personality? As is, how is it not bot-ish? 01:46 AM December 28, 2007 from web in reply to guykawasaki jeneane @guykawasaki re: "what would you do," I would decide why only 300 people are following truemors. Has the over-linking increased the follows? 01:54 AM December 28, 2007 from web in reply to guykawasaki guykawasaki @jeneane I never promote @truemors. It started way after @guykawasaki. I took @guykawasaki and ran with it. 10:56 PM December 27, 2007 from twhirl in reply to jeneane jeneane @guykawasaki you asked what I would do if I had 2000+ followers and my company/client had 300. Constant gratuitous links would not be it. 02:08 AM December 28, 2007 from web in reply to guykawasaki guykawasaki @jeneane You and I define gratuitous differently. Truemor is my labor of love. I think it's highly interesting stuff. If you'd rather hear 11:12 PM December 27, 2007 from twhirl in reply to jeneane guykawasaki @jeneane about my cat rolling over, then you're going to be disappointed with my tweets. 11:13 PM December 27, 2007 from twhirl in reply to jeneane jeneane @guykawasaki - So you love the business and every piece of content you link to? You are linking specifically to stories you love? Ok then. 02:22 AM December 28, 2007 from web in reply to guykawasaki jeneane @guykawasaki but you're linking to truemors stories almost constantly. Are you in love w/ truemors or the content there? 02:16 AM December 28, 2007 from web in reply to guykawasaki guykawasaki @jeneane What is the difference between loving Truemors and its content? It's the same thing. 11:17 PM December 27, 2007 from twhirl in reply to jeneane jeneane @guykawasaki, by the way I have no prob whatever you want to do--just trying to point out more than a few people are like: alright already! 02:17 AM December 28, 2007 from web in reply to guykawasaki guykawasaki @jeneane Fair enough. And honestly, not sarcastically or bitterly, if they don't like it, they should not follow. No harm, no foul. 11:19 PM December 27, 2007 from twhirl in reply to jeneane guykawasaki @jeneane There are six or so truemorists. I have total faith in all of them to post very interesting stories. We now moderate non-truemorist guykawasaki @jeneane so more or less, no "crap" will appear on Truemors. 11:25 PM December 27, 2007 from twhirl in reply to jeneane guykawasaki @jeneane This is not to say you'll love every story. But you can't say that about NPR, CNN, NYT, IHT, WS 11:26 PM December 27, 2007 from twhirl in reply to jeneane jeneane @guykawasaki they are not people. you are a person. i don't follow those entities, and I don't follow truemors. 02:27 AM December 28, 2007 from web guykawasaki SF Zoo director said the tiger's cage wall was too low! http://tinyurl.com/24krjl? 11:29 PM December 27, 2007 from web jeneane @guykawasaki you just sent me to a broken link, and I saw that story on drudge 5 hrs ago. ok i'll stop bashing my head against the wall now. 02:32 AM December 28, 2007 from web in reply to guykawasaki guykawasaki @jeneane Link worked fine for me. We'd love to have you as a truemorist since you're so on top of the news. 11:36 PM December 27, 2007 from twhirl in reply to jeneane jeneane @guykawasaki how much does it pay? 02:42 AM December 28, 2007 from web in reply to guykawasaki guykawasaki @jeneane Goes here: http://tinyurl.com/24krjl If it went to the blank AP page, how did you see it in Drudge? 11:47 PM December 27, 2007 from twhirl in reply to jeneane jeneane @guykawasaki the news that the wall was too short was all over drudge a few hours ago (2-3 story links). 02:48 AM December 28, 2007 from web in reply to guykawasaki jeneane @guykawasaki it still goes to a blank AP page for me -- can someone else check guy's link? maybe it's my browser? 02:50 AM December 28, 2007 from web in reply to guykawasaki jeneane @guykawasaki okay reports from others are that the link still goes to an AP blue page. Just trying to help. sheesh! 02:56 AM December 28, 2007 from web in reply to guykawasaki guykawasaki @jeneane wow, that is bizarre. I go here: http://tinyurl.com/24krjl 12:00 AM December 28, 2007 from twhirl in reply to jeneane jeneane @guykawasaki - Strraaange! ok well i have to go to sleep. i'm sure everything will make sense when i wake up. ;-) 03:02 AM December 28, 2007 from web in reply to guykawasaki guykawasaki @jeneane I can't control it. I pasted in the story link and Twitter put in the tinyurl! 12:01 AM December 28, 2007 from twhirl in reply to jeneane ----------
...all of which begs the question: should we be trying to control conversation on twitter or should we be participating in conversations that develop organically on twitter. Sure, there is room for both. For everything. Twitter is wide open if you can fit wide open in two lines of text. But spamming me continual links to mainstream news stories that I can see on 10 other sites is not talking to me, it's not engaging me. IT'S YOUR FACE WITH A BOT DOING THE WORK
It's broadcast, old boss-new boss, it's like metametaspam - you have a site that aggregates news from other sites and then you aggregate it again for me in a feed I subscribe to expecting to hear from you.
Maybe I'm expecting too much of the Twitter crowd. And maybe that's why blogging still gives me what I need.
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