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Workaround for Twitter @Replies Issue

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Saved by Shoq Value
on May 14, 2009 at 10:54:58 am
 

 

For news and updates on this issue, follow twitter.com/shoq

 

Background

 

For reasons known only to Twitter's marketing plan or technical nerds, their handling off @replyNames is in transition from something everyone once understood pretty well, to a new and convoluted process that has confused and annoyed nearly everyone.

 

If you really need to real the whole weird backstory, written by geeks who love to confuse you with pointless jargon and concepts you have no use for, start here: http://bit.ly/3cVkAHowever, if you're a normal person who enjoys simple language, and because all of this will probably change again before you've even digested this page..

 

As of right now, all you need to know is this. 

 

Twitter has changed how @replies are handled.  By default, when you click any kind of "reply" button (on the Twitter web site, in Tweetdeck, and in some other client app.), your tweet will only be seen by the person that you replies to, and only those of your followers who also already follow that person.  This upsets many of us who want--or need--to discover new people by watching who our friends engage by @replying to them.

 

To Illustrate:   Should  @whitehouse reply to @northkorea with a message like "We're invading your weird little country at dawn," the only people who will see that reply are @northkorea and anyone following that name.  Thus, even though you follow @whitehouse, you could miss their reply message if you never knew there was a @northkorea to follow in the first place. 

 

See the problem? This new and misguided policy removes the wonderful transparency that made Twitter a great place to discover people and ideas, and it's completely contrary to the spirit of most forms of social networking.  Twitter simply must fix it, or their entire future could be in doubt. 

 

But until they do, here is the less than ideal...

 

Workaround

 

     If you want your followers to see your reply to someone, even if they don't follow that person:

 

  • WITHOUT USING ANY REPLY BUTTON:  Simply type the @replyName normally at the beginning of your tweet.

    There are two downsides to this:

     

    • You did not easily copy the name into the input field using a single click (very annoying)

       

    • The conversation is not a true "reply thread," so people who view your tweet cannot trace back to the tweet you were replying to.  Since many people do that to read the context of a tweet, this is major PITA (ask your grandma what that means).

       

       

  • USING ANY REPLY BUTTON:  Just add a period or exclamation points in front of the @reply name.

    Example:  !@shoqsmom Because I placed an exclamation point before your @name, all of my followers can see this tweet, even if they don't follow you

     

    • NOTE1:  While this makes it easy to reply, and forces the tweet to all your followers, the tweet is NOT threaded (as discussed above).

       

    • NOTE2: Simply prepending "RT" to front of your tweets has the same effect as an exclamation point.  It will be seen by all of your followers (assuming then you ARE retweeting--and not simply replying).

 

     If you only want those also following a @name to see your reply to them, simply use any standard Reply button function.

 

 

Protest This Bizarre Policy Change at Twitter

 

By tweeting your displeasure with something like this (copy at will). The CCs are Twitter executives, and the petition hashtag protesting this policy change.

 

DEAR @TWITTER:  PLEASE RESTORE THE TRANSPARENT OPEN @REPLIES POLICY  cc: @ev @biz #fixReplies

 

If you want to sign a more formal petition, here's one. There are probably many others

http://www.petitionspot.com/petitions/fixreplies

 

 

For news and updates on this issue, follow twitter.com/shoq

 

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