Why I love Twitter but tolerate Facebook

Hello. My name is Samantha and I am a Twitter addict.

Well then you have no soul!!

Do you realise there are 582 people in the world who are hanging on to my every word, wondering what I will tweet next? At least, I like to believe there is. And who am I to deny the public what it wants. Supply and demand, people! And I've supplied the Twittersphere with 26,742 little drops of wisdom and humour. Ok, and a few photos of food I am about to eat. But those 582 people aren't under any sort of obligation to follow me. They choose to. If my posts take a direction they don't like or they finally get sick of me live-Tweeting Liverpool matches, they can (and do) unfollow me. Que Sera, Sera.

I have made new real life friends from Twitter (have even been asked on dates) and scored lots of cool free stuff - over $100 worth of Diva jewellery, anyone? Two nights accommodation in Melbourne thanks to WotIf? Yeah! I have been the first to know about breaking news and in turn, broken the news to my Facebook friends. I have witnessed scandal and suspicion and interacted directly with some of my favourite people in the world.

I have an iPhone. People always joke that I'm addicted to my iPhone but that's simply not true. Take my Echofon app off it & it would be much like my old Nokia 3315. It makes phone calls & receives text messages. But with Twitter, it's like carrying around your friends in your pocket. Waiting for a dentist appointment? Tweet about it & be entertained with a joke. Feeling sad? Tweet about it & let your friends cheer you up. Need advice? Ask Twitter if they can help with your problem. Don't know what to have for lunch? Do a quick Twitter poll. Don't want to watch a TV show alone? Search for the show's hashtag and join the conversation. Don't know something and need it explained in layman's terms? Tweet it with the hashtag #LazyWeb. Lost your dog? Tweet a photo and details and watch as your search for your dog becomes a trending topic as hundreds of strangers are on the lookout. Interested in the Titanic? Watch as @TitanicRealTime live tweets the whole event as it happened 100 years ago.

Basically my main argument for why any anti-Twitter sentiment is wrong is pretty much this. Twitter is only as awesome as the people you follow. I follow 378 carefully selected Twitter accounts. Some of them are celebrities, some are football related, some are humorous accounts, some are people I know in real life, some are just random citizens of this planet. I've been on Twitter for three years now. In three years, that's all I've accumulated - 378 accounts to follow. I've followed and then unfollowed some accounts but that's what happens on Twitter. It's no big deal like on Facebook. Facebook has this weird social obligation to be "friends" with someone who was in that Maths B class you took for a month before the school realised you weren't smart enough for algebra and you now have to put up with every single damn post about their toddler. On Twitter, those rules aren't as set in stone. With most people, you can just unfollow them. I've ignored friend requests from people who bullied me in high school. Why in the name of Kuzco the talking llama would they think I want to be "friends" with them?

Now if anything I've said about Facebook has left you confused or worse, you actually thought 'Luckily every one of my Facebook friends hangs on my every status update regarding the cute things about little Tilloffonee' (or whatever you named your spawn), then we probably won't be Twitter friends. Or you might follow me, but I probably won't follow you back. Twitter is all about MY interests and I'm sorry but I don't care what Tilloffonee did next. I liked your status when you announced you you were pregnant and again when you HAD the baby. That's it. I'm done. I don't like children all that much but I was happy for you! I would have looked at the first photo of your newborn and probably liked it, but from there on out, you became dead to me. I glaze over when you start posting about Tilloffonee and probably only get broken out of my stupor by some hilarious @ mention someone has posted on Twitter.

But notice I said I 'liked' your posts? Chances are I didn't comment because I don't want to be notified every time someone else posts the exact same damn post. "Congrats!", "OMG Congrats!" or the ever thrilling "Congrats x". I don't care. Besides, my post would have just been the same as that anyway. I recognise this.  If someone on Twitter gets a particularly entertaining response to the announcement, they will retweet it. Then I will read it. But on Twitter, I don't have to see any conversations between two people unless I choose to follow both of them. And when those conversations get annoying, I have been known to choose my favourite of the two and unfollow the other. Problem solved. Twitter is my world and it is my prerogative to mould it exactly how I want it to appear.

Nobody follows the exact same 378 accounts I do. If a Twit just wants their feed to be filled with musicians, then that's what they do. They may be followed by sports fanatics, new mums and porn stars but they don't have to care about that. It's their Twitter feed that becomes their own personal Twittersphere. How many followers you have is irrelevant (until the @ mentions start, then Twitter can get really awesome!) But people reading this may be bored to tears with my Twitter feed. In fact, here is my Twitter feed as it appears right now. Not that interesting, right?

{Click to enlarge}

But I don't care what you think, because I find it interesting. I may be bored to tears by other's Twitter feeds. So what?

You see, Twitter is like free speech and who doesn't love free speech? Communists, that's who! And you don't want to be known as a Communist, do you?

Miss SAMawdsley xx

Questions

• Do you prefer Facebook or Twitter? Why?
• Have you ever tried Twitter? What happened?
• Should I be following you on Twitter? Plead your case! :P
• Why aren't you following @SAMawdsley and @Princess_Sassy?

Notice I don't own Facebook merch.?