The tweet is on
By Adrian Weckler
Setting up an account
It is easy to set up a Twitter account.
Simply visitTwitter.com and ‘sign up’ (for free).You will be asked to supply the usual details (name and e-mail).You can set your privacy level by choosing whether everyone sees your account or just people you approve. (Most people allow their accounts to be publicly accessible.)
You can set up as many accounts as you wish, although you will need a different e-mail address for each account. Unlike a web domain, you do not have to ‘prove’ that you are who you say you are. So if the name Brian Cowen is still available (it is not), you can use that as your account name.
You will be asked what name you would like your account to appear as. Many people choose their own name (eg @adrian weckler), while some choose their business’s name. You will also be given the option of providing a short description of yourself or your company. Finally, you will be given the options of uploading a photo and supplying a web address, if you have them.
For a step-by-step video tutorial on how to set up a Twitter account, see our special instruction video blog at www.yourtech.ie
Starting off: be brief
They say that brevity is the soul of wit. As if Twitter didn’t trust us to observe this, it has imposed a 140-character (about 20 words) limit on the length of any one tweet. This forces one to get to the point rather quickly. Once you type your point out, hit update.
Your tweet will appear in the ‘Twitter stream’ (the list of tweets) of anyone following you.
Following people
Twitter is a two-way street: you follow people and they follow you. To follow people, you can use the ‘find people’ search box at the top of the page.
Once you’ve found someone you know or recognise, you will be able to see who they follow and who is following them. You can follow any one of these people and any one of their followers.
Once you follow someone, their updates will appear in your Twitter stream.
Being followed
Once you begin to follow people, some (or all) of them will follow you back. That means that whatever you write or tweet will appear in their Twitter streams. Amassing followers is important to some people and not important to others.
If you own an emerging business and would like to spread the word about something, the more followers you have, the better. Once you get going on Twitter, you will find that you will occasionally get followers from people and places you have no connection with .Some of these will be spam followers, designed to get you to click on links or to buy services. Typically, these will have images of an attractive girl or a celebrity.
Sharing links
One of the things that Twitter is now used most for is sharing references to news stories. Typically, people see a news story, mention it in a tweet, and post a weblink for further reading on the internet (usually a news website or a blog).
It’s not just news links that are popular. Local events or impressive photographs are often heavily linked to.
‘Re-tweeting’
One of the biggest compliments you can be paid on Twitter is to be re-tweeted. This means that someone else thinks that your update is worthy of being heard by his or her own circle of followers.
When you start to use the service more, you will find things worth re-tweeting yourself. Sometimes it is a news story, an article or an event that you think is important. Other times, it may simply be an observation on something that you think is especially poignant or articulate.
Re-tweeting is one of the ways that news travels so quickly on Twitter: if one person with 100 followers tweets about a minister resigning, several people will retweet that post. Within minutes, thousands, or even tens of thousands, of people will see the original item.
It is considered to be a required courtesy to acknowledge the source of an item you wish to re-tweet. Re-tweeting is also a valuable exercise, insofar as it alerts other people to a potentially interesting person (the original tweeter) that they may wish to follow themselves.
Using Twitter for pictures
Unlike Facebook, you cannot post pictures directly to Twitter.
What most people do is use one of a number of Twitter-friendly websites. Two popular services are Twitpic.com and Y frog.com. Y frog also allows you to post videos. Botha re free.
Further controls over your privacy
Sometimes, you may not wish to include individuals in your Twitter updates. But if the y choose to follow you, what can you do? You have an option of blocking them from your Twitter stream.
That means they cannot see what you are saying, unless someone else that they follow re-tweets what you have said. Blocking someone carries the risk that the blocked person will complain or, if you are well know, will boast about it.
Using a Twitter client
Once you start tweeting regularly, you might find the use of a Twitter ‘client’ handy. A Twitter client is a software program that lays out your Twitter streams in a more attractive way.
Instead of having to click on different parts of your Twitter web page to see replies or direct messages, these are laid out in different columns for easy reading.
It is also an application in its own right, rather than an internet web page.
The most popular Twitter client is Tweetdeck (www.tweetdeck.com). Other popular ones include T whirl (www.twhirl.com) and Brizzly (www.brizzly.com).
Security on Twitter
Over the past few months, there have been several waves of phishing attacks on Twitter.
Typically, this is where you get a ‘direct message’ such as : ‘‘ha ha! This you?” from someone you appear to know that asks you to click on a weblink.
When you click the link, you are asked to input your Twitter account name and password to ‘verify’ your authenticity.
That is simply a way for the hacker to get private information that you may have contained in your account.
If you fall prey to this tactic, the hacker will then send direct messages to all of your contacts, in the hope that they will repeat the cycle.
If this happens to you, change your Twitter password.
