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Twitter hasn’t reached its full potential. It’s just not intuitive enough to most people. When a new user signs up, they don’t know: - Who/what to follow, exce

Twitter hasn’t reached its full potential. It’s just not intuitive enough to most people. When a new user signs up, they don’t know: - Who/what to follow, except a handful of celebrities and sports teams - When to compose tweets vs. passively consume them - The esoteric grammar of the intimidating Twitterverse It seems like one must be a celebrity, CEO, or super user to use Twitter at all. Clearly, that’s improving, albeit at a glacial pace. Worst of all was how long it took for Twitter to add Twitter Topics.

siegeofcondor 7y ago
> Twitter hasn’t reached its full potential. It’s just not intuitive enough to most people. When a new user signs up, they don’t know: What? Twitter's selling point was how simple and intuitive it was. > It seems like one must be a celebrity, CEO, or super fan to use Twitter at all. That's because Twitter changed from a "user" focused to a "celebrity/journalist/CEO/etc" focused platform. If seems like you got introduced to twitter in the past 2 or 3 years. Twitter was nothing like it is now. You are describing what twitter was 5 or 10 years ago. I don't think twitter is going back towards a "user" oriented site. The same with youtube, instagram, etc.
- keenmaster 7y ago
  For Average Joe or Median Marsha: YouTube —> watch videos Instagram —> see and share photos Reddit —> discuss whatever you want Facebook —> share thoughts and experiences with friends Twitter —> ??? I know what Twitter can be, if you really optimize it, but it takes patience which a lot of people don’t have.
  - davchana 7y ago
    I think it is: Reddit-> ???? Twitter: One Way Small Texts
    - bscphil 7y ago
      Why don't you think the parent post is accurate? Reddit is terrible logged out, but that's because its use case is basically "follow subjects that interest you, discuss whatever you want". I'm also not sure what you mean by "one way" texts. That seems to describe the format of Twitter, rather than its use case. Why would someone want to send a small text to no one in particular?
      - davchana 7y ago
        I mean & I interpreted that the common user/man thinks of what (is the purpose) after hearing these site names. Not many people outside HN Crowd or tech knows about reddit; many of those regular fols use Facebook for reddit-related things like discussions, meme, groups, meetings etc. So, for a common user (not HN Crowd), Reddit is unknown -> ????. Same with twitter, as one of the above post said User thinks Twitter is for Celebrities, so they follow, & think that Twitter is for one way communication from Celebrities from a higher stage, saying their opinions & User may reply to that Celeb, but it will be drowned in other 100s of replies, just like as if a Politician is talking from a stage higher up & any of the audience member's voice will not be that high/hearable & also that that Politician is not talking one-to-one with that particular user; albeit as one-to-many users as in collective audience.
        bscphil 7y ago
        Makes sense, I think I misunderstood what you were saying.
        krapp 7y ago
        > I mean & I interpreted that the common user/man thinks of what (is the purpose) after hearing these site names. I don't see any evidence that people in general assume the name of a site must literally describe its purpose, or that anyone is confused when it doesn't. Amazon.com seems to do fine, despite not being a site about the Amazon. >Not many people outside HN Crowd or tech knows about reddit; many of those regular fols use Facebook for reddit-related things like discussions, meme, groups, meetings etc. So, for a common user (not HN Crowd), Reddit is unknown -> ????. Reddit ranks as one of the top 10 most visited sites among American users, and is in the top 20 worldwide. You can find articles about it surpassing Facebook in popularity last year.
  - stinkyball 7y ago
    Twitter —> shouting into the void ?
    - Tsiklon 7y ago
      I prefer to scream into the void. but your mileage may vary. Also it's quite useful for shouting at some company's poor social media interns whom they use as a proxy or alternative for customer service.
  - madiathomas 7y ago
    If I use twitter again, I will use it as a news source. I will follow news outlets, IT personalities, sports personalities, sports clubs, and Presidents. I won’t even tweet. Tweeting when you aren’t a celebrity or public figure is a waste of time.
    - coredog64 7y ago
      I’d say it’s worse than a waste of time. You might make a jocular comment or retweet something that, when taken out of context, can get you ostracized or fired.
      - madiathomas 7y ago
        More risk for zero gain.
    - swozey 7y ago
      I never understood the point of twitter until I started following journalists, professors, lawyers, etc. I still wish Twitter had Google+'s circles feature, so I could group those (along with engineers) and flip between them. I don't personally want to deal with multiple twitter accounts.
      - Palomides 7y ago
        twitter private lists more or less allow this, for following at least
      - detaro 7y ago
        Twitter's list feature might help you a bit to get that, as might the tweetdeck client.
  - tnolet 7y ago
    Twitter —> follow tech people —> ...but learn about CrossFit, Code of Conduct, Speaking / Leadership, LGBTQ+ things, being at airports, Trump things, pronouns, remote work or bust and male toxicity. Sometimes a bit of Kubernetes or React, but not too much.
- bscphil 7y ago
  > That's because Twitter changed from a "user" focused to a "celebrity/journalist/CEO/etc" focused platform. That seems about accurate. Same with Instagram, in my experience, although if you know a bunch of other people on the platform I suppose you can all follow each other, and then the experience is different. Actually, I personally follow less than 100 people on Twitter. None of them are celebrities, journalists, or CEOs. They're not people I know either. Twitter for me is basically RSS for posts by a handful of interesting people who don't have blogs. I force it to stay in "latest tweets" mode and hide the sidebar with the latest viral hashtags. I spend about 10-15 minutes a day on Twitter. It's very telling that everything about Twitter seems to be actively trying to make it as difficult as possible to use it this way. The "ideal" Twitter user seems to be someone who follows a few thousand celebs and spends every spare moment working through the latest viral tweets and memes.
  - 9HZZRfNlpR 7y ago
    They are actively trying to make it difficult use Twitter like that. They measure that 15 mins of your in a day and every test they run shows by showing you meaningless latest dramas, making you angry and write sarcastic bits triples your engagement and time spent on the site. The value spent to you, the real value, doesn't mean anything, it works directly against their financial interest. Stay strong :)
    - Cougher 7y ago
      "showing you meaningless latest dramas, making you angry and write sarcastic bits triples your engagement and time spent on the site." I don't know if Twitter is following the media's lead or if the media is following Twitter's lead. Probably both. Paying attention to neither has been a positive in my life.
    - Jd 7y ago
      All of the main social media platforms at this point have exactly the same set of skewed incentives (i.e. attention maximizing instead of value generating). I sense some sort of massive opportunity around campaign the formula but not the exact way forward yet.
panarky 7y ago
The post is about nested conversations, not Twitter generally. What do you think about nested conversations on Twitter?
- threatofrain 7y ago
  keenmaster's post is about Twitter's potential for growth or success, and it frames calculations one might do for nested conversations. What do you think about keenmaster's post? If you think there's a better framing, then by all means, lead the room.
krapp 7y ago
>It seems like one must be a celebrity, CEO, or super user to use Twitter at all. Clearly, that’s improving, albeit at a glacial pace I mean, most people who use Twitter are none of these things, and still seem to manage. Your comment seems to assume that someone who signs up to Twitter will never have even heard of it. And... "esoteric grammar" of the "intimidating" Twitterverse? You do know the concept of hashtags alone have become so well-known that they're used in everyday English, right?
- keenmaster 7y ago
  It goes beyond hashtags. I was speaking more to the structure of discourse. Even people who are used to speaking in public, on record, in front of cameras, frequently fail to engage with others properly on Twitter. That’s pretty intimidating to me. There just seems to be so much nervous energy on that platform. You could enjoy your day, write one tweet just to express your thoughts on something before going to sleep, then have people halfway across the world jump down your throat and wake up to a nasty surprise.
  - krapp 7y ago
    I would agree that Twitter's design has led to a lot of toxic discourse, but I would disagree that it's the result of people not knowing how to use the site "properly." Quite the opposite - that's what the intended usage of Twitter leads to.
thom 7y ago
This is funny to me because I remember being at Chirp, the first Twitter developer conference, 10 years ago. There was a bit of a chill in the air because they'd just announced their own mobile client, effectively competing with their own ecosystem. Part of their justification for doing this was that the onboarding process, as you describe - the user testing video they showed was pretty damning. Surprising to hear no progress has been made.
badrabbit 7y ago
Oh...and privacy and data ownership as well. It's a shame how they haven't tried to monetizie by having premium accounts and merging twitter with periscope to compete with snapchat and friends.
sixothree 7y ago
It took me a good year of giving twitter a second chance for it to begin to be useful to me. I started by following all of my podcast and youtube follows. Still, it's not my first or even third destination. But maybe if I'm in line at the grocery. Nobody cares about anything I post. So why would I bother.

siegeofcondor 7y ago

> Twitter hasn’t reached its full potential. It’s just not intuitive enough to most people. When a new user signs up, they don’t know: What? Twitter's selling point was how simple and intuitive it was. > It seems like one must be a celebrity, CEO, or super fan to use Twitter at all. That's because Twitter changed from a "user" focused to a "celebrity/journalist/CEO/etc" focused platform. If seems like you got introduced to twitter in the past 2 or 3 years. Twitter was nothing like it is now. You are describing what twitter was 5 or 10 years ago. I don't think twitter is going back towards a "user" oriented site. The same with youtube, instagram, etc.

keenmaster 7y ago
For Average Joe or Median Marsha: YouTube —> watch videos Instagram —> see and share photos Reddit —> discuss whatever you want Facebook —> share thoughts and experiences with friends Twitter —> ??? I know what Twitter can be, if you really optimize it, but it takes patience which a lot of people don’t have.
- davchana 7y ago
  I think it is: Reddit-> ???? Twitter: One Way Small Texts
  - bscphil 7y ago
    Why don't you think the parent post is accurate? Reddit is terrible logged out, but that's because its use case is basically "follow subjects that interest you, discuss whatever you want". I'm also not sure what you mean by "one way" texts. That seems to describe the format of Twitter, rather than its use case. Why would someone want to send a small text to no one in particular?
    - davchana 7y ago
      I mean & I interpreted that the common user/man thinks of what (is the purpose) after hearing these site names. Not many people outside HN Crowd or tech knows about reddit; many of those regular fols use Facebook for reddit-related things like discussions, meme, groups, meetings etc. So, for a common user (not HN Crowd), Reddit is unknown -> ????. Same with twitter, as one of the above post said User thinks Twitter is for Celebrities, so they follow, & think that Twitter is for one way communication from Celebrities from a higher stage, saying their opinions & User may reply to that Celeb, but it will be drowned in other 100s of replies, just like as if a Politician is talking from a stage higher up & any of the audience member's voice will not be that high/hearable & also that that Politician is not talking one-to-one with that particular user; albeit as one-to-many users as in collective audience.
      - bscphil 7y ago
        Makes sense, I think I misunderstood what you were saying.
      - krapp 7y ago
        > I mean & I interpreted that the common user/man thinks of what (is the purpose) after hearing these site names. I don't see any evidence that people in general assume the name of a site must literally describe its purpose, or that anyone is confused when it doesn't. Amazon.com seems to do fine, despite not being a site about the Amazon. >Not many people outside HN Crowd or tech knows about reddit; many of those regular fols use Facebook for reddit-related things like discussions, meme, groups, meetings etc. So, for a common user (not HN Crowd), Reddit is unknown -> ????. Reddit ranks as one of the top 10 most visited sites among American users, and is in the top 20 worldwide. You can find articles about it surpassing Facebook in popularity last year.
- stinkyball 7y ago
  Twitter —> shouting into the void ?
  - Tsiklon 7y ago
    I prefer to scream into the void. but your mileage may vary. Also it's quite useful for shouting at some company's poor social media interns whom they use as a proxy or alternative for customer service.
- madiathomas 7y ago
  If I use twitter again, I will use it as a news source. I will follow news outlets, IT personalities, sports personalities, sports clubs, and Presidents. I won’t even tweet. Tweeting when you aren’t a celebrity or public figure is a waste of time.
  - coredog64 7y ago
    I’d say it’s worse than a waste of time. You might make a jocular comment or retweet something that, when taken out of context, can get you ostracized or fired.
    - madiathomas 7y ago
      More risk for zero gain.
  - swozey 7y ago
    I never understood the point of twitter until I started following journalists, professors, lawyers, etc. I still wish Twitter had Google+'s circles feature, so I could group those (along with engineers) and flip between them. I don't personally want to deal with multiple twitter accounts.
    - Palomides 7y ago
      twitter private lists more or less allow this, for following at least
    - detaro 7y ago
      Twitter's list feature might help you a bit to get that, as might the tweetdeck client.
- tnolet 7y ago
  Twitter —> follow tech people —> ...but learn about CrossFit, Code of Conduct, Speaking / Leadership, LGBTQ+ things, being at airports, Trump things, pronouns, remote work or bust and male toxicity. Sometimes a bit of Kubernetes or React, but not too much.
bscphil 7y ago
> That's because Twitter changed from a "user" focused to a "celebrity/journalist/CEO/etc" focused platform. That seems about accurate. Same with Instagram, in my experience, although if you know a bunch of other people on the platform I suppose you can all follow each other, and then the experience is different. Actually, I personally follow less than 100 people on Twitter. None of them are celebrities, journalists, or CEOs. They're not people I know either. Twitter for me is basically RSS for posts by a handful of interesting people who don't have blogs. I force it to stay in "latest tweets" mode and hide the sidebar with the latest viral hashtags. I spend about 10-15 minutes a day on Twitter. It's very telling that everything about Twitter seems to be actively trying to make it as difficult as possible to use it this way. The "ideal" Twitter user seems to be someone who follows a few thousand celebs and spends every spare moment working through the latest viral tweets and memes.
- 9HZZRfNlpR 7y ago
  They are actively trying to make it difficult use Twitter like that. They measure that 15 mins of your in a day and every test they run shows by showing you meaningless latest dramas, making you angry and write sarcastic bits triples your engagement and time spent on the site. The value spent to you, the real value, doesn't mean anything, it works directly against their financial interest. Stay strong :)
  - Cougher 7y ago
    "showing you meaningless latest dramas, making you angry and write sarcastic bits triples your engagement and time spent on the site." I don't know if Twitter is following the media's lead or if the media is following Twitter's lead. Probably both. Paying attention to neither has been a positive in my life.
  - Jd 7y ago
    All of the main social media platforms at this point have exactly the same set of skewed incentives (i.e. attention maximizing instead of value generating). I sense some sort of massive opportunity around campaign the formula but not the exact way forward yet.

panarky 7y ago

The post is about nested conversations, not Twitter generally. What do you think about nested conversations on Twitter?

threatofrain 7y ago
keenmaster's post is about Twitter's potential for growth or success, and it frames calculations one might do for nested conversations. What do you think about keenmaster's post? If you think there's a better framing, then by all means, lead the room.

krapp 7y ago

>It seems like one must be a celebrity, CEO, or super user to use Twitter at all. Clearly, that’s improving, albeit at a glacial pace I mean, most people who use Twitter are none of these things, and still seem to manage. Your comment seems to assume that someone who signs up to Twitter will never have even heard of it. And... "esoteric grammar" of the "intimidating" Twitterverse? You do know the concept of hashtags alone have become so well-known that they're used in everyday English, right?

keenmaster 7y ago
It goes beyond hashtags. I was speaking more to the structure of discourse. Even people who are used to speaking in public, on record, in front of cameras, frequently fail to engage with others properly on Twitter. That’s pretty intimidating to me. There just seems to be so much nervous energy on that platform. You could enjoy your day, write one tweet just to express your thoughts on something before going to sleep, then have people halfway across the world jump down your throat and wake up to a nasty surprise.
- krapp 7y ago
  I would agree that Twitter's design has led to a lot of toxic discourse, but I would disagree that it's the result of people not knowing how to use the site "properly." Quite the opposite - that's what the intended usage of Twitter leads to.

thom 7y ago

This is funny to me because I remember being at Chirp, the first Twitter developer conference, 10 years ago. There was a bit of a chill in the air because they'd just announced their own mobile client, effectively competing with their own ecosystem. Part of their justification for doing this was that the onboarding process, as you describe - the user testing video they showed was pretty damning. Surprising to hear no progress has been made.

badrabbit 7y ago

Oh...and privacy and data ownership as well. It's a shame how they haven't tried to monetizie by having premium accounts and merging twitter with periscope to compete with snapchat and friends.

sixothree 7y ago

It took me a good year of giving twitter a second chance for it to begin to be useful to me. I started by following all of my podcast and youtube follows. Still, it's not my first or even third destination. But maybe if I'm in line at the grocery. Nobody cares about anything I post. So why would I bother.