4 ms·

You're not in the minority, you're in the majority. Not that many people actually use Twitter. That you think you are in the minority is a weird cultural phen

You're not in the minority, you're in the majority. Not that many people actually use Twitter. That you think you are in the minority is a weird cultural phenom - people with the loud voices behaviours signal to us what is 'normative' even if it is not! Because you see a lot of people using Twitter, you think 'everyone's doing it'. In reality - most people are far more neutral/central than the voices in the web. And most people just don't care about such things. Try ignoring Twitter for a few months. You won't feel left out, trust me. It's mostly noise.

gaius 10y ago
It's not helped by organizations such as the BBC who report on what happens on Twitter as if it is actually news.
- jomamaxx 10y ago
  "It's not helped by organizations such as the BBC who report on what happens on Twitter as if it is actually news." Ah. That's a trick used by 'credible news outlets' to promote an ideology when they're supposed to remain 'neutral'. When a journo wants to say something ideological, but is limited in editorial scope by supposed 'neutrality', all he needs to do is find a Tweet somewhere that says what he wants, and can then publish it and say 'people are saying XYZ' - as though it represents a 'popular view' - even though it does not. I am not ideological or political, but it's far more common among left-ish leaning editorialists. About 85% of people working at the BBC, CBC, CNN are left of centre, they are professionals and are pretty good at trying to remain neutral, but the biases come out one way or another. The editorial chiefs don't care because they're cut from the same cloth - so as long as the veneer of professionalism is there (and they're not offending advertisers) it flies. 80% of news - even at the 'reputable sites' is total fluff. They need to keep writing about something. So they invent the news. In another sense this is not a new phenom: in the old days everyone read/watched local news. They report on the most inane thing: cats stuck in trees. But people loved it because it was super local and relevant to them, i.e. 'gossipy'. Twitter is the 'gossip' for the new urban types that don't have strong local social networks to gossip within. At my grandmothers house, people would stop in, chat for 20 mins with Gran, and after they were gone I had no idea why they stopped by! It was just gossip. That's the 'old timey' Twitter!
  - jomamaxx 10y ago
    I should add, there are actually very few news outlets that make the pretence of being centrist. In particular, Western state agencies such as BBC and CBC and the US, arguably CNN 'kind of' long that vein. They are definitely left of centre in actuality, though not an obvious editorial bias, it's definitely there. As far as other agencies (Sky, NBC, Fox, MSBNC, FT, WSJ etc), well, the aforementioned 'trick' is used a lot.
hacker_9 10y ago
Twitter had 350 million active users in Q1 of 2016, this is quite a lot actually.
- pmontra 10y ago
  Still a minority if you think how many are sharing their thoughts on fb or are using whatsapp for group messaging.
- VLM 10y ago
  The majority might be bots. Surely for financial reasons the most tenuous definition of "active" will be applied. Still, its like the old saying about email, I don't care if 99% of email is spam, as long as I get my electric bill email on time, I'm all good. Twitter might become like TV, where everyone knows everyone watches, but it turns out statistics prove almost no one actually watches. Its like the endless debates about religion where its a ritual to say X where X is "I believe in Y" and people endlessly argue about the difference between doing something and being something, as if they have to be linked.
  - jomamaxx 10y ago
    " but it turns out statistics prove almost no one actually watches" ... ha ha .. ha ... People still watch a lot of regular TV and will continue to do so for quite a long time.

gaius 10y ago

It's not helped by organizations such as the BBC who report on what happens on Twitter as if it is actually news.

jomamaxx 10y ago
"It's not helped by organizations such as the BBC who report on what happens on Twitter as if it is actually news." Ah. That's a trick used by 'credible news outlets' to promote an ideology when they're supposed to remain 'neutral'. When a journo wants to say something ideological, but is limited in editorial scope by supposed 'neutrality', all he needs to do is find a Tweet somewhere that says what he wants, and can then publish it and say 'people are saying XYZ' - as though it represents a 'popular view' - even though it does not. I am not ideological or political, but it's far more common among left-ish leaning editorialists. About 85% of people working at the BBC, CBC, CNN are left of centre, they are professionals and are pretty good at trying to remain neutral, but the biases come out one way or another. The editorial chiefs don't care because they're cut from the same cloth - so as long as the veneer of professionalism is there (and they're not offending advertisers) it flies. 80% of news - even at the 'reputable sites' is total fluff. They need to keep writing about something. So they invent the news. In another sense this is not a new phenom: in the old days everyone read/watched local news. They report on the most inane thing: cats stuck in trees. But people loved it because it was super local and relevant to them, i.e. 'gossipy'. Twitter is the 'gossip' for the new urban types that don't have strong local social networks to gossip within. At my grandmothers house, people would stop in, chat for 20 mins with Gran, and after they were gone I had no idea why they stopped by! It was just gossip. That's the 'old timey' Twitter!
- jomamaxx 10y ago
  I should add, there are actually very few news outlets that make the pretence of being centrist. In particular, Western state agencies such as BBC and CBC and the US, arguably CNN 'kind of' long that vein. They are definitely left of centre in actuality, though not an obvious editorial bias, it's definitely there. As far as other agencies (Sky, NBC, Fox, MSBNC, FT, WSJ etc), well, the aforementioned 'trick' is used a lot.

hacker_9 10y ago

Twitter had 350 million active users in Q1 of 2016, this is quite a lot actually.

pmontra 10y ago
Still a minority if you think how many are sharing their thoughts on fb or are using whatsapp for group messaging.
VLM 10y ago
The majority might be bots. Surely for financial reasons the most tenuous definition of "active" will be applied. Still, its like the old saying about email, I don't care if 99% of email is spam, as long as I get my electric bill email on time, I'm all good. Twitter might become like TV, where everyone knows everyone watches, but it turns out statistics prove almost no one actually watches. Its like the endless debates about religion where its a ritual to say X where X is "I believe in Y" and people endlessly argue about the difference between doing something and being something, as if they have to be linked.
- jomamaxx 10y ago
  " but it turns out statistics prove almost no one actually watches" ... ha ha .. ha ... People still watch a lot of regular TV and will continue to do so for quite a long time.