This is an interesting debate, which I think is still best discussed through an understanding about the one rule of twitter.

http://twitter.com/ev/status/1941806414

Unfollow, or follow. I realise, there are large gaps of 'grey' between those rules. @pat and @ben_h tweeted me yesterday essentially saying unfollowing me was fine, except that there we're tweets of mine they still found valuable even though I was having the @foursquare autotweet happening. I'm not sure how we solve this, but I think responsibility sits on the side of the reader, not the tweeter (if that makes sense) to make their own value from any given tweet stream.

I had a moment like @ross when I was in Sydney, where I checked in at a place on @foursquare and 3 minutes later was met by a smiling @socialalchemy. We chatted briefly and then agreed to catch up later that night, which was amazing. Matt (@socialalchemy) didn't have @foursquare running then, so saw it on his tweet stream.

In the end, it was hugely valuable for me and I think if you have a look at how guys like @fredwilson are using it, you'll find that they are building their own understanding of @foursquare etiquette and inviting people to meet them where they are at, which provides instant relevance and value for those reading their streams.

http://www.avc.com/a_vc/2009/10/a-couple-foursq...

http://www.avc.com/a_vc/2009/07/playing-foursqu...

Nice example Steve.

What it demonstrates though is that foursquare builds in method of using twitter that is very place focussed, and promotes "finding" or "connecting" with people at different places (well obviously one of the many things it does).

In terms of our discussions, why can't twitter build in functionality that allows you to follow someone, but to block any tweets with particular key words. More management on the user, but say I followed you and ross and then entered key words that I didn't want and for those tweets to be blocked say "foursquare", "cowboys" and "dinosuar hunting"...

that might solve pat's issue.

I have no doubt of the possible benefits...my question is the interlinking of social media and the management of content overload...which is more nuanced than follow or unfollow as @pat and @beh_h are alluding too. (the continual search for a more mature and nuanced interwebs)

I'd tend to agree that the onus should be more on the consumer than the publisher. When you place a barrier to entry on publishing, people will worry more about the value of tweets and edge cases will likely fall into the gaps. If people post less, the information stream loses content value for anyone who's personal idea of relevance falls below whatever the standard is determined to be. (Or to put it another way, if you restrict the source material to cater to current use cases, you're also putting a restriction on the scope of future uses).

I like the idea of the layered approach - first quality cut is via who you follow, the second cut is via selected filtering of that sub-stream.

And if twitter doesn't supply this functionality then there's an opportunity here for someone to create a wrapper web-app/client that does.

I get where you are coming from Dave...but I still think putting more onus on the consumer is not a good idea. Especially if you are the one who wants people to engage with your information, your ideas and your stuff. Engagement and connection demands respect - and I expect as a consumer that people will provide me with content that is relevent to me (or if it isn't presented in a way where I can determine that quickly), is easy to access, is presented in an interesting way - otherwise I just don't bother with it.

We are saturated by information.

If it isn't published well - in all facets of what that means - it won't find an audience.

Web 2.0 makes us all producers and consumers. That means we have to take our producing seriously and all work harder, change the education system and provide us with the skills to make information that is worthwhile...

Will we lose edge cases, maybe. Do many, many edge cases get lost if presently poorly - you bet.

I guess we need to figure out a balance then : )

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Twitter shouldn't build that into the platform, that's where apps like
Tweetdeck let you create groups and custom search panels. They fill that
need really well already.

Twitter are aiming for another horizon, where you don't actually have to
follow people - Twitter learns enough that it can simply recommend you a
super relevant stream of messages. I'm not sure how far away this is, but it
is an awesome vision.


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That functionality is even better, Ross. That is what I want a stream of tweets relevant to me - my search word concept would be a step towards that I'd argue. Plus, I reckon trying to manage TweetDeck effectively is a full-time job and I don't have that sort of time.

But yes, the future of the web is about information management and effective delivery of important information to people in real time.

Which, is why I think it isn't enough to put the onus on the reader as @stevehopkins suggests - if we want to communicate we have to consider our audience and make the information as easy for them to understand and access as much as possible - everything should be well tagged!!!

I respond to a certain type of consciousness (such as your visual above :)) so I quickly tune in or out around that. It's intuitive. I'm drawn to big picture, original thinking. I see Twitter as a tool for sharing new information.

I follow you Ross because I am interested in the information you find in terms of your areas of interest like tech, business and people.

I use Twitter as a search engine more than a social tool. I love tweets with links to information I don't know exists, but that I will be interested in.

I am working at making the technology exist for me in the same way newspapers do - I don't want it to be intrusive, or overwhelming. I want information that is going to engage me, inspire me and teach me something new...I regularly unfollow people if I feel their link to tweet ratio is getting too low.

I can see where you are coming from...but I still don't understand the desire to link all these different applications. I think that only works for tech-obsessives whose job it is to use and understand every tool. Most of the world doesn't do that - they find what they like and they stick to that...I had many facebook friends unfriend me when i linked my twitter feed to facebook...I think aggregation of these tools is more technically interesting than socially interesting...

It links with the whole Google Wave thing - that form of information gathering is overwhelming and I'm wanting more from my technology that being a fire hydrant of information. I want it sorted, I want it sifted and I want to have to deal with only what will be interesting to me...that is the next evolution I am interested in...when twitter can get a good understanding of who I am and automatically keep tweets that are of no value to me out of my stream. That is where I want the future to be...

I love this "I use Twitter as a search engine more than a social tool. I
love tweets with links to information I don't know exists, but that I will
be interested in."

I see Twitter as the best tool right now to get insights about what somebody
is doing, and what they find interesting (that probably also interests me).
Likewise I see it as a tool to share what I am doing and what I find
interesting too - and as a place to try things and see how people react :)

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I understand the "what they find interesting", that makes heaps of sense and I'm on the same wavelength there - but I guess because of the way I share I am less comfortable with the "what somebody is doing" reason for using twitter. It feels voyeuristic to me on one level, and while I agree notions of privacy and IP and relationships will be completely rethought through this zeitgeist that is web-point-whatever...I haven't got there myself yet.

Maybe because I don't exist fully in the same area as you do digital innovation etc. - many of my contemporaries, and those i want to engage with don't use twitter...and so i have to find out what they are doing and if it is relevant to me in different ways...

Love your work though Ross...

Yeah of course! Don't think that's unique, the web is still just one medium
I use too - I try to integrate them all though. The "what I'm doing" is
often what sparks interesting conversation (often when you see those people
offline) - just like you might ask somebody "did you have a good weekend?
what did you get up to?" If I share some of those things (events,
activities, projects) openly online those conversations can fast forward to
the interesting bits!

ddonahoo <daniel.donahoo@gmail.com> wrote, in response to rosshill:

I don't know good content, but "I know it when I see it".

Foursquare updates aren't good content to me, but I can understand that it's in the eye of the beholder. If it's interesting, cool. If not, unfollow. That's the nice thing about twitter, following is a choice - it's not like a forum where you have to wade through pages of crud. It's easy just to unfollow if the noise becomes too high - or follow again if interesting conversation pops up.

I purposely have avoided more "scalable" clients like Tweet deck and stick with Tweetie specifically so I feel the pain from noise and become pretty ruthless about who I do (and don't) follow.

Yeah that's why I use Tweetie (mac and iphone) and then the pure web
interface too. They keep the flow manageable (if you keep your following
well-tailored).

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I think that this is a basic consequence of a broadcast tool like twitter - amongst any subset of a given social graph there will be people who disagree on just what constitutes "useful" or "relevant" (and this might be different depending on your relation ship with the person providing the information). Even if Ross and Pat were to reach a consensus, it won't extend any further through their own social graphs and as twitter doesn't have a way to enforce a content standard via its interface, the only real control is on the consumer end of the pipe via following/unfollowing and search/filter capabilities. You could probably argue that a common standard of relevance is probably one of the most commonly applied filters to a follow list.

This isn't to say that people shouldn't apply a basic "reasonableness" test as a social convention, but by definition there are always going to be edge cases where people will disagree.

Yeah that's why I wanted to start this thread for discussion - to find out
what different people find interesting. What types of messages do you like?

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I probably sit somewhere in the middle - I generally prefer some sort of context in a message, but the level of context depends on the person (if it's someone I know well I'm generally more tolerant of pointless guff than with someone I don't). I also tend to use a client with no notifications, so I skim read chunks of tweets at a time rather than being interrupted.

To be honest I would probably tend towards more information in the stream rather than less as you can always filter stuff out, but there's not much to do if the data isn't there in the first place.

I disagree with @mentions being noise - you've got to judge on a tweet by tweet basis whether what you're saying is worthwhile to others. So recommending places for coffee, sure, that's valuable for others to know. But banter between friends, not nearly so much - that should remain as a reply, not an open broadcast.

As for FourSquare, I don't care when you or anyone else goes out for coffee. Recommendations and knowing when people are out and about (or that they are the 'Mayor' of a certain location) are different things, and have vastly different value. Ross, for your example of asking who wants to have lunch, I don't have a problem with that on Twitter. There's a level of engagement and asking for a response. Completely different ballgame to tweets saying "I am at X."

If I'm following a person, then constant retweets are annoying - I'm following you because of the value in what *you* say much more than the value of what others that you may read say. We live in an age of information overload - I want to streamline my input, not double it.

Of course, everything in moderation - I don't expect every tweet to be insightful, I don't expect never to see retweets. Links are useful in broadening what I'm aware of.

Alright another line of thinking - if I share a lot of links on Twitter, but they should from a context sense be on delicious instead, what does that leave for Twitter?

Delicious is great for links, but Twitter is great for adding your own 2 cents, without writing a full blog post. Don't just summarise the link's content, give it your own angle.

That said, you do want to make it somewhat obvious so people know what they're clicking on (especially with all these URL shorteners).

Oh that's an interesting point - "I am at X" isn't useful by itself, it requires locality and initiative to give it value. Last week Pieter Peach saw me check in at Benito's so he gave me a call and then we caught up for a chat for 20 minutes - it was awesome! It did take his initiative to make that value happen though...

I am happy to see anything as long as there is context.

Foursquare is fine, because it has context, I know it is a feed through foursquare, and even if I didn't it gives me a link to click through, and if I did that I would find out it was foursquare.

Single words and an @mentions are noise. They have no context to anybody except the person you are directing it to.

A way to very quickly avoid that problem is to include a #hastag, which gives immediate context or even just remembering that you are having conversations in public is important.

So, if you were tweeting @me with a cafe suggestion, instead of "@joannespain postal hall" perhaps "postal hall have great coffee @joannespain" would be better, because then it adds value to all of your followers, not just me.

The issue I'm seeing with foursquare is that it is very local. If somebody
is down the street, that's great! If they're out of the country it is
completely useless. I sent a message this morning "who wants to have lunch"
on foursquare and that worked well, but I feel I would have had a better
response on Twitter because more people pay attention there. Either way,
local is only relevant to a small percentage of people.

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