Question about Twitter

[Xelor]

Last evening I visited Momma and got to chatting with her nurse, "Betty." Betty was checking her Twitter account -- something she said she does every so many days to every other week or so. It seems she'd picked up some 150+ new followers since her last foray onto Twitter, and when I encountered her, she was clicking through them, so to speak, to determine whether she wanted to follow them as well.

Now, I'm not a Twitter member; thus foreign to me is anything beyond occasionally clicking on a tweet in a news article or an email I receive. The notion that folks must maintain their accounts and contacts is self-evident; however, the prospect of clicking through some 150 profiles and, based on what appears to be the precious little and largely inconsequential information people put there -- it's not like Linked In, a CV or other professional profiles of some stripe -- determining whether they merit one's "approbation"/apprehension is anathema to me.

Things got even more bizarre...Betty showed me explicit solicitations she'd received from folks who offer to follow her in return for her following them. I just thought "WTF?" What possesses someone to mutual-follow another on account of the fact of one or the other person following oneself? I mean, really...Neither has said anything of note, as far as they each know; neither has done something for the other; and nothing evinces either party's having done something warranting the other's acclaim, assuming following be the Twitter equivalent of such.


So my question to the Twitterers here is this: do you follow folks merely on account of their following you?

 

[AlbqOwl]

I follow a lot of folks on Twitter and suppose most of my followers would be family and friend. I honestly have never checked to see who is following me. I use Twitter mostly to follow public comments/sentiment on the news of the hour, day, or whatever. Not as a communication tool.

On Facebook I get a lot of friend requests from people I never heard of just because they saw me tagged by or I posted to somebody they knew but I didn't. I don't befriend those folks unless they are family or important shirttail relatives.

 

[JANFU]

Last evening I visited Momma and got to chatting with her nurse, "Betty." Betty was checking her Twitter account -- something she said she does every so many days to every other week or so. It seems she'd picked up some 150+ new followers since her last foray onto Twitter, and when I encountered her, she was clicking through them, so to speak, to determine whether she wanted to follow them as well.

Now, I'm not a Twitter member; thus foreign to me is anything beyond occasionally clicking on a tweet in a news article or an email I receive. The notion that folks must maintain their accounts and contacts is self-evident; however, the prospect of clicking through some 150 profiles and, based on what appears to be the precious little and largely inconsequential information people put there -- it's not like Linked In, a CV or other professional profiles of some stripe -- determining whether they merit one's "approbation"/apprehension is anathema to me.

Things got even more bizarre...Betty showed me explicit solicitations she'd received from folks who offer to follow her in return for her following them. I just thought "WTF?" What possesses someone to mutual-follow another on account of the fact of one or the other person following oneself? I mean, really...Neither has said anything of note, as far as they each know; neither has done something for the other; and nothing evinces either party's having done something warranting the other's acclaim, assuming following be the Twitter equivalent of such.


So my question to the Twitterers here is this: do you follow folks merely on account of their following you?

Nope-
No different than those on FB that have 1000 plus Friends. They receive some sort of emotional gratification from numbers of people following them/friends on FB. Shallow people.

 

[NeverTrump]

Last evening I visited Momma and got to chatting with her nurse, "Betty." Betty was checking her Twitter account -- something she said she does every so many days to every other week or so. It seems she'd picked up some 150+ new followers since her last foray onto Twitter, and when I encountered her, she was clicking through them, so to speak, to determine whether she wanted to follow them as well.

Now, I'm not a Twitter member; thus foreign to me is anything beyond occasionally clicking on a tweet in a news article or an email I receive. The notion that folks must maintain their accounts and contacts is self-evident; however, the prospect of clicking through some 150 profiles and, based on what appears to be the precious little and largely inconsequential information people put there -- it's not like Linked In, a CV or other professional profiles of some stripe -- determining whether they merit one's "approbation"/apprehension is anathema to me.

Things got even more bizarre...Betty showed me explicit solicitations she'd received from folks who offer to follow her in return for her following them. I just thought "WTF?" What possesses someone to mutual-follow another on account of the fact of one or the other person following oneself? I mean, really...Neither has said anything of note, as far as they each know; neither has done something for the other; and nothing evinces either party's having done something warranting the other's acclaim, assuming following be the Twitter equivalent of such.


So my question to the Twitterers here is this: do you follow folks merely on account of their following you?

I follow mostly journalists and those in the media biz. I use twitter mostly for early access to breaking news. Often the reporters working on stories behind paywalls will work out what they are doing before they post articles. :mrgreen:

I have some really weird followers though and obscure people from TV.

 

[Superfly]

So my question to the Twitterers here is this: do you follow folks merely on account of their following you?

Nope. If someone follows me, I click on their profile and see what I think. If I like what I see, I'll give them a follow. If they beg for follows or RTs, I don't bother.

I only talk politics on Twitter, though, and most of the people I follow are news agencies, talking heads, etc. Plus a few funny ones.

 

[Superfly]

I follow mostly journalists and those in the media biz. I use twitter mostly for early access to breaking news. Often the reporters working on stories behind paywalls will work out what they are doing before they post articles. :mrgreen:

I have some really weird followers though and obscure people from TV.

Same here - people don't take social media seriously, but I look on Twitter for breaking news before I do anywhere else, and many, many times, news on Twitter has broken before regular news outlets.

 

[Skeptic Bob]

I stopped using Twitter a few years ago but I didn’t follow people just because they followed me. I didn’t care about follower numbers and I didn’t want my feed filled up with things I wasn’t interested in. Unless your livelihood depends on it, I don’t get the need to have a bunch of followers. That just feels too much like an obligation.

 

[Xelor]

TY for your feedback.

Cheers.

 

[Abbazorkzog]

This poll would've been better as a simple yes/no/sometimes. Waaay less confusing that way.