'Too Many Tweets Make a...'

A great many people chunter on at me about how drably, navel-gazingly dire the world of Twitter is. ‘Who cares’, they bleat, ‘what colour socks you’re wearing, or when you’re putting the kettle on, or which street you’re on at 2.14 on a Thursday afternoon?’ Mmm. I suspect they’re right about the lattermost type of tweet, guilty as I doubtlessly am of it, but the whole argument is, as you will soon see, as dire as these people are. It is an unimaginative straw man of a waste of effort. The drawback they see in Twitter also happens to be its overwhelming wonder. Depending on the individual, the only limit is the imagination. You can use Twitter for anything, from real-time news to football and cricket scores; you can discover new music, gauge opinions on new products; you can get jokes and you can find jobs. It is a matter of knowing what you want and building up a personalised, relevant community of like-minded people. It’s really quite simple.

‘Oh, but people should get out and live their lives, rather than live a false life of microblogging.’ This is an easy line of thinking to blast out of the water. A little further along the spectrum of that argument, we might as well cease imagining. No point in films, no point in music. Twitter isn’t necessary to a fulfilled life, of course it isn’t, but it is entertainment, like television. It is fully customised and interactive entertainment as well.

The line of thought that really renders these critics dreary and unnecessary, though, comes from experience. Over the last week, Twitter has certainly not replaced my daily life, but actually enhanced it. I was babysitting yesterday evening, and quite fancied getting a pizza delivered to quell some tummy rumblings. I had one fundamental setback in this plan, though: I am so familiar with the walk to the family’s house that I had long forgotten which road they live on. Racking my brains, then, to at least arrive at a guess, Twitter friends @paulsaxton, @chrisbardell, @ignisphoto and @womaninblack all kindly confirmed that I was correct, leaving me only to look at the house number on the door and order away. Without Twitter, I might have become really rather hungry yesterday evening. Is that useless fart-arsing on the internet, ladies and gents?

The second exhibit is nothing short of wonderful. In celebration of my sad little Twitter community reaching 300 nerdy, arse-picking followers, I threw open a competition – free print for the person who most imaginatively insulted my profile picture. It garnered immediate responses from across Norfolk, from friends and colleagues to a whole plethora of people who had never even met me. The insults were hilarious and biting, affectionate and perceptive, and each one was delivered in a spirit of good humour that even some friendships and family relationships never arrive at. It was brilliant. That alone attests to the worth of Twitter, but there was a further benefit to the competition, that will send each of its critics creeping back into their closed-minded, beige little hovels: someone contacted me via Twitter to offer me some photography work – and where was I when I discussed it? Not in an office, but in a beautiful park on the north Norfolk coast. Bear that in mind next time anyone whines about social networking, and enjoy these insults from the competition.



‘Nothing I can think of is as much of an insult as having to look at your face for 5 minutes whilst I try to think of something insulting...’ – Eddie Warren

‘Finally, Ryan understands the difference between him and the rest of the male population…’ - Adrienne Jolly, my very own careers adviser

‘Ryan was disappointed by the tame nature of the 'Gay photo book' he bought on eBay.’ - @chrisbardell

‘Gnomes could read books well before colour pictures were invented...’ - @stuartflatt

‘Get a fucking haircut you art-school cock!’ - @mattjware

‘John Gay's observation that Ryan was “a fey twankhole wearing his granddad's wig back to front” was wholly unexpected.’ - @womaninblack

‘You look like Sacha Baron Cohen in "Bruno". Only gayer.’ @johnkahun

Drab and dire, is it? Mmm. Yeah.

Dullards.