Pourquoi je n’utilise plus Twitter

Ou plutôt : pourquoi je ne l’utilise presque plus. Mes « followeurs » auront probablement remarqué que je suis bien silencieux sur le site de microblogging depuis plusieurs mois maintenant (mon dernier tweet remontant au 7 décembre exactement). La raison est simple : le flux d’information est trop intense.

Cela tient selon moi à la nature éphémère d’un tweet, affiché quelques minutes seulement avant d’aller se perdre dans les arcanes du web. En effet, la page d’accueil personnalisée, qui recense tous les messages des comptes auxquels vous êtes abonné, est régulièrement réactualisée pour afficher les tweets en temps réels. Même en étant abonné à « seulement » 150 comptes et des poussières, il est impossible de lire les centaines de messages publiés quotidiennement sans y passer des heures.

De fait, Twitter est, à mon sens, un espace d’expression sans aucun doute intéressant, mais certainement pas un espace de discussion, c’est-à-dire propice aux échanges.

Mais je disais donc que je n’utilise presque plus Twitter. La seule chose qui me rattache encore à Piou-piou, c’est mon abonnement au hashtag #xl8 (et un profane largué, un). Pour faire simple, je reçois automatiquement tous les messages liés à la traduction sur mon lecteur de flux (j’utilise Google Reader). Malheureusement, j’ai déjà du mal à lire la cinquantaine que je reçois tous les jours.

Je dois avouer que si Twitter ne me sert qu’à faire la pub de mon blog, sans écouter ce que les autres ont à dire, je n’en vois plus l’utilité.

13 réflexions au sujet de « Pourquoi je n’utilise plus Twitter »

  1. It’s the nature of the world, we always miss out on something, but that’s no reason not to look at it when you have a moment. I am sure I miss some great TV, but just because I miss some great TV sometimes, that’s no reason never to turn the TV on when I have a moment. 🙂

    1. You are totally right. But between Facebook, LinkedIn, my e-mails and Skype, I hardly find the time to check on Twitter too… Maybe I should try to follow just a few dozens of people, I would have a clearer view, just like when I began using it…

  2. Interestingly (for me, anyway), I came to this post via Twitter, as I stopped using RSS for exactly the same reason that you quote for leaving Twitter. The reason why I get my info from Twitter is that it’s been filtered by my peers – all the best stuff ends up on it, whereas for me, RSS is indiscriminate and overwhelming. Horses…

    1. So in other words, you rely on your peers to do the dirty work (filtering and sharing)! Just kidding. I usually get less RSS posts than tweets in a single day, so I still manage to quickly see what’s really interesting (often just reading the title or the first sentences).

  3. I am agree with you. that twitter is more become of Saying then listening, If you would like to say something frequently then use it. but you can listen what others would like to said, In this i found facebook more interesting

  4. Good point. It sure does get overwhelming, but TweetDeck has helped me keep things organized, but I need to set it up again on the new computer. I do really like Twitter, and I need to tweak my account a bit to have groups, etc.

  5. I can really understand you. Sometimes it´s really so overwhelming all this stuff. but I think, unfortunately, this is a fact of our world and society today, not only of the www! every day more and more information. so you sometimes just want to push the « off »-button, relax and enjoy the calmness.

  6. Laurent, I understand you when you say you want to leave Twitter for good – it’s very unilateral, and it makes it very hard to follow conversations, whereas on blogs you have more of a real chat going on, plus you can be notified by e-mail or RSS feed whenever there are updates. I really prefer RSS and blogs, as they both leave a more lasting mark on the internet (think about Google, SEO, marketing). But make no mistake: what you say on Twitter may apparently last only a few minutes, but it remains somewhere on the web and will definitely be indexed somewhere and can resurface in search results to either speak in your favor or haunt you forever – so I will remain on Twitter because of the obvious benefits in terms of exposure.

    1. You are right, and as a matter of fact, I am currently trying to bring back my Twitter to life. My problem was that I had too many subscriptions (too much to read). So I’ve « cleaned up » my account. I also created a personal Twitter to follow non-translation accounts. I am still looking for the perfect tool to make it easy to follow and update (currently trying Tweetdeck) though.

  7. I use HootSuite, which you can install as a standalone application, Firefox add-on (https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/user/5019829/) and/or iPhone app. I also like a Firefox add-on called « HootSuite hootlet », a button that you can click to instantly share the URL to a web page you are visiting (https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/hootsuite/). HootSuite’s free version allows you to add up to 2 accounts and it publishes updates from (up to 2) RSS feeds automatically – this may come in handy if, for example, you want your followers (like Céline, who doesn’t use RSS feed readers) to know that your blog has a new update.

    What I don’t like, and don’t ever look for in a Twitter application, is a notification feature. Twitter notifications, except Direct Messages, are dangerous productivity killers.

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