In the Twitter World, It’s all About the Credit

Professional bloggers, newscasters, authors, politicians and students find themselves in this vacuum of a race to find information. The one that “tweets it out” gets the street credit for finding that information. This creditability is desired to either look important or smart, or to look “cool” and “savvy.” This is not a situation limited to only younger twitter users. Even those in professional fields sometimes find Twitter being just as competitive as their professional expertise. The race for say sales and ratings then manifests itself in the race for tweets and followers.

In the Twitter world, much creditability is given to the person that finds something interesting online, and becomes the first one to tweet it out. The “retweet” function then only advances this desire for attention. Being “retweeted” shows that not only is this person following you, but is a vote of approval that they liked what you posted. Those person’s followers then get to see that you are the “smart” or “cool” or “savvy” person that found that information. It sometimes can grow into a rivalry that boarders on immature, but yet even the most professional bloggers and tweeters use the same tactics.

I have seen two elected officials tweet and @reply each other in a hostile tone, I have seen people call others out for tweeting something first, and I have had two personal examples of friends (and fellow Tweeters) who have competed with me for Tweet credit.

Not only is something interesting found online limited to a video, or a blog post, or a good article. The race extends to those who can come up with something funny, or captures something with camera phone and then posts the picture on their Twitter. Maybe to embarrass someone else, or just for a laugh, but the race to be the first one to coin the joke, or post the picture is as intense as the more material Tweets.

I notice it even with stupid examples. A friend of mine and I were walking through campus when we noticed a typo on a sign. As I pulled out my phone to take a picture, he started to get mad thinking I was going to upload the picture to Twitter, and thus take credit for seeing the sign and I guess somehow get the “laugh credit.” Really he saw the sign first, so he thought he was entitled to have the option of posting it first if he chose too. You can see how idiotic sometimes this becomes. But he was so angry that I tried to take the picture that he blocked my shot and then took out his iPhone to take the picture. The photo generated numerous views and @replies so he was satisfied with his credit.

In another example, another friend coined a certain phrase in one my tweets. It was a hashtag, and he insisted that I say in my tweet that he was the one to come up with it. If was very funny and we could tell that it was going to stick as a joke, so he insisted that even though I was the only one with my phone, that he be mentioned for the credit.

These behaviors are very annoying, but since much of the Twitter action I follow is professional, I can understand the natural desire to have due credit. The other examples show how stupid and trivial things can become.

Brush up on your Twittequette before you become a serious user.