Twitter for Beginners

1. Twitter for everyone

There are a few things to know about Twitter, unfortunately, very few people will let you in on them. Its generally expected that people find their own way. There are very good reasons for this. Firstly, Twitter is still rather new. It started with the intention of being the SMS of the internet, but has quickly evolved into something different. It is still evolving, and there is no definitive approach to using it. Secondly, Twitter is a tailored experience. The purposes for which you use it will define your approach and vice versa. Once you have a reasonably sized group of followers you will adapt your approach in line with how many of them use it. Its a learning experience, really. The thing is, without some kind of guidance, it can be very difficult to find any followers at all, or decide on the approach to take. It would help you to know some of the basics. This guide has been designed to cover all of these basics and let you find your own route into Twitter. If parts of it appear too basic, simply skip them and head to the next section. Ill cover the broad essentials of signing up for Twitter, and throw in some tips on creating a good account. Ill also explain what a social media client is, and provide links to four of the better ones. From there, Ill look at the best ways of finding people to follow. For beginners, Id suggest that finding suitable followers is even more important than deciding what to tweet. Youll learn the latter from the former. Dont worry though, I wont be totally ignoring the Tweet. Ill cover the basics, including the posting of photos and links, and will tell you exactly what a Retweet is. Ill even try to answer the thorny question of why we should be bothering in the first place. Ill be taking a look at some of the hazards you may find on Twitter, from the fairly benign spammers to the utterly terrifying teenage pop fans. Youll learn what a Twitchfork Mob is, but sadly, not how to avoid one. Finally, Ill provide a glossary of some of the key terms used on or about Twitter, and well take a look at some wonderfully creative leetspeak. Youll know what I mean by this when we get there.

2. Getting started
The very first step is as easy as joining any online service. All you need is a browser and an email address. Go to http://twitter.com and fill in your details at the Sign Up button. It wont take long, and within minutes youll be away. Handle This will be your Twitter name, so choose carefully. You can change it later on, but once you start tweeting, it will become closely identified with you, so pick one youll be happy with. It is prefixed with an @ sign and will be unique to you. Most people do not use their real name, preferring to choose a pseudonym. The choice is yours, but its a good idea to at least pick something memorable or easily communicated. Try to avoid strings of numbers, such as @sandy_girl3253258. You look like a spammer, or worse, unimaginative. Avatar Bluntly, youre an egg. A default egg. This is not a good thing. There are armies of spammers and bots on Twitter and they use one of two types of avatar. A. Girls in silly poses B. Eggs

Until you change your avatar to something else, people will easily assume that you are either a spammer, or not very good at Twitter. Use anything else, it can be a picture of you or a TV character, or a funny cartoon. Just as long as its not an egg. Bio Youre given 140 characters to explain who you are, or some other item about yourself. Dont take it too seriously, unless youre using Twitter for work. Users who do that that take their bio VERY seriously, and usually include views my own, not those of my company or other disclaimer. Nobody pays any attention to this.

Accessing Twitter So far, weve only used the Twitter website. You may have worked out for yourself that it isnt very good. For regular use, I would recommend downloading a client. Clients are bits of software that allow you to read and post tweets as well was upload photos and links. Some of them carry additional features, such as the ability to mute certain terms, which can be very useful if youre trying to avoid finding out the United score. They can be used on desktops, on smartphones and on tablets. There are many to choose from and most of them are free. I use Tweetdeck, but theres a selection of them below: Tweetdeck Echofon Hootsuite Seesmic Trust me, it does make things easier, especially as the Twitter site is so queasy. And if you will insist on still using Facebook, you can access your newsfeed in the same place.

The Fail Whale. What you see when Twitter can't hack it

3. Finding people to follow

Your Twitter experience will be largely defined by the people you follow. Eventually, your follows will become a mini community, with several connections burgeoning into actual friendship. That said, its still difficult for a novice to work out who to follow. One way to get started is to identify someone you already know on Twitter and use them as a guide until you find your own way. Celebrities are followed by millions of people, their handles are easily found. Having said that, they are rarely the most interesting people on Twitter. Far too many of them tweet solely about themselves, even retweeting compliments and praise. No, youll be better off with people who are far less needy.
Mentioning no names

More organic ways are to search for topics of interest and find people commenting on the things you like. Useful topics include live TV, sport events and current affairs. They are all sufficiently current to have people chatting along with them. If you find someones tweets interesting, check their timeline to see who they interact with, youll find that a network of like-minded individuals soon emerges. Try responding to other users tweets, particularly if they have asked a question. They may respond, if they do great. If they dont, dont lose heart, find another conversation and try again. If you find youre not getting many responses you might want to try talking to different users. Some users, even ones who arent well known in the real world, have thousands of followers. They will receive hundreds of responses every day, and anything you send to them may get lost in the rush. If youre trying to connect with people, you might prefer to start with people with fewer followers. Theyre more likely to follow back. There are also Twitter jokes. These may be mockery of a current event or a general hashtag game. These often take the form of puns on a given topic. Some of them involve excruciating wordplay, but no pain, no gain. Simply click on the hashtag, or enter a search term and see all the people talking about that topic. If you like what someone is saying, follow them (you can always unfollow them if they turn out to be insufferably dull).

Follow Friday This is a Twitter tradition. On Fridays, users will recommend people to follow by using the hashtag #ff. If someone you follow recommends somebody else, its a good tip to check their profile and see if you want to follow them. Some people will choose to follow you back. Others need to find you. Join the conversation get involved on the hastags and give people a reason to follow you. You need to be Tweeting.

4. The Tweet
The Tweet is the basic element of Twitter. It is a short message of up to 140 characters. It can be on any topic, and for almost any purpose. Tweets are commonly derided by non-users as what I had for breakfast updates. They are more than that. They can be personal updates, links to interesting things on the web, comments on news stories, sports teams, or TV shows, jokes, multi-party conversations, indeed almost anything. Here are some examples Today is my Friday. Yesterday was my Monday. SCORE. They're talking North vs South on the telly and whinging because it's much cheaper up north. Oh get over it. We're just better ;-) I've just done a fist-bump for the first time; it hurt a tiny bit and I had to suppress a desire to say "ow" #middleclassuncool Hello Twitter. Can you help me find a nice room to live in somewhere in Bristol, from June onwards? I have all kinds of faith in you. If the customs queues are long at airports, it helps out security officials if you go around sniffing other peoples luggage. Today's cover all phrase for things I don't understand at work is: "Of course, like when Harold Bishop came back, all evil, in Neighbours". SCHOOLS. Give PE lessons an Olympic feel by building a new sports hall, using it once, then knocking it down. Would saw off my right arm for a coffee #belowtheline Feeling a lot more positive this morning, yesterday's reading has made a big difference. To the exam! Would anyone like Game of Thrones (series one boxed set) on BluRay? All you southern people who've been going on about the weather for weeks; don't ever live in Manchester. Seriously. You'd die of rain. Christopher Nolan on The Dark Knight Rises http://bit.ly/IXGpdq Hope our 15,000th Tweet is memorable and interesting. Outside the context of Twitter, it is difficult to say exactly what to tweet. It took me a while to grasp it. Start following people and youll soon pick it up. I started by throwing a few tweets about what I was watching on TV, or what I was up to that day. Pointless in the immediate term, but I got the hang of things. So, tell people what youre up to. Somebody will be interested.

Photos and Links Dont restrict yourself to merely tweeting words. Twitter can host photos and pictures, taken directly from your smartphone or uploaded from your desktop. Click add photo from the Twitter website or social media app to upload. Links are part of the lifeblood of Twitter. Users send links to websites, articles and other items to one another. Some links can pass through thousands of users in a very short period of time. Its why people go to the effort of making things like this:

Babies: made for the internet

To keep within character limits, users often shorten links using an online URL shortener, such as bit.ly. It turns this: http://careers.guardian.co.uk/careers-blog/apprenticeshipscareer-paths Into this: http://bit.ly/J5MClG Some social media clients have URL shortener built-in and do the job for you. Retweets Users who like specific Tweets, because they are funny, insightful etc can Retweet them. This forwards the Tweet to that persons followers with the prefix RT. Through this you will start to see other peoples tweets in your timeline. If you like what that person is saying, follow them. Retweets are generally considered to be compliments. If you like what someone is saying, go ahead and retweet it. Trends Twitter identifies the top topics or phrases being discussed and places them in a list of Trending Topics. Anything that is popular on Twitter can be described as trending.

Topics lists can be filtered as Worldwide, by country or to major cities. Topics can be simple search terms, such as The Avengers, or hashtags, such as #lifeinthenineties. Hashtags are added to words or phrases to aid searching (the search function doesnt need the tag, but it makes it easily understood). Tags are used almost as punctuation.

5. Why?
Thats the practical stuff done with. What I havent told you is probably the least obvious and most obvious question of all.

What is it all even for? As I said earlier, Twitter is an individual experience. Different users employ it for different purposes. Some people use it for self-promotion, to shout at celebrities or to broadcast what they had for breakfast. At its heart, though, Twitter is best used for conversation. This is often in relation to an external event, such as a TV show, a football match or a news event, and there is a range of opinion and comment brought to each of these. Some of it is incisive, some of it informative, some of it is dull and worthy, but some of it is laugh-out-loud funny. Using Twitter while watching a live TV show can be brilliant it turns your laptop or mobile into a virtual living room and can really enhance the experience. If you have a particular hobby or interest, you can find people who share it, or organisations that might prove useful. This might be a long-term interest such as a band or football team, or a short-term, situational interest such as planning a wedding or moving house. That said, you dont need any specific hook to get chatting. A lot of people use it simply to talk to one another, shooting the breeze in real time, wherever they are in the world. Twitters speed also makes it a very swift disseminator of news. If a major story breaks, it passes round Twitter like wildfire, usually with accompanying links so that you can see the source of the story. You will occasionally also see appeals for missing persons or for witnesses to crimes, giving the social network a genuine social benefit.

6. Hazards
Im not going to tell you how to avoid spam, phishing etc, except to warn you that although viruses are thankfully rare, when they do appear, they tend to be transmitted through the Direct Messaging (DM) system. Twitter contains a Spam reporting system. Every time you see something untrustworthy, click to report it. If you receive a Direct Message from someone offering to show you who has been criticising you online its a scam. Report and delete. These will often appear to be from one of your followers it isnt really them. In three years on Twitter, it has happened to me just once. No, the bigger hazards on Twitter are far more insidious. Teenage girls Reading the Trending Topic (TT) list at any time (though especially during the US awake hours) will make you despair. It will also bear no relation to the comments in your own feed. Reading the TT list alone may make you think that the battle between One Direction and Justin Bieber is the defining conflict of our age. It really isnt. You can go right ahead and ignore that. Twitchfork mobs The ease of use of Twitter means that rumours and comment can spread around the world in mere minutes. A common pattern is for an inflammatory comment or statement to be made (usually in the real world, or in a newspaper) and for people to join in universal condemnation. In some cases, they can form digital mobs (or Twitchfork Mobs) and hound the person responsible. It is odd behaviour, but it can be illustrative of how powerful networks can be. Advertisers are now working very hard to try to harness this power. If you see things getting a little heated, dont worry. Theyre just angry humans with keyboards. The cops! A few recent high profile cases have demonstrated that what is said on Twitter echoes in real life. And its a very loud echo chamber. Users have been arrested, charged and in some cases prosecuted for the content of their tweets. One user was prosecuted for joking that he was going to blow Robin Hood Airport sky high.

Another has just served time in prison for making malicious communications following the on-pitch collapse of footballer Fabrice Muamba. At time of writing, North Wales Police are in the process of arresting users who broadcast the name of a rape victim following a high profile trial. The victims name is confidential, and the users may be found in contempt of court. That these users were careless/stupid/drunk and stupid is no defence. Twitter is a public forum and the law has jurisdiction here. Golden rule? Dont be stupid.

Also, don't spend too long on it, or you might start seeing it everywhere

7. Glossary
@ The @ sign is used to call out usernames in Tweets, like this: Hello @Twitter! When a username is preceded by the @ sign, it becomes a link to a Twitter profile. See also Replies and Mentions. Avatar The personal image uploaded to your Twitter profile in the Settings tab of your account. Bio A short personal description of 160 characters or fewer used to define who you are on Twitter. Blocking To block someone on Twitter means they will be unable to follow you or add you to their lists, and we will not deliver their mentions to your mentions tab. Bot Short, inevitably, for robot. These are automated programs designed to operate Twitter accounts for marketing, spamming or fun purposes. Bots may be used by legitimate companies to follow people who mention their product. They are also used by people who create them for fun. For an example, send a tweet with the word Robocop in it. Client A piece of software used to manage social media accounts on PCs, smartphones and tablets. Connections The Applications tab in your Twitter settings shows all third party websites and applications to which you've granted access your public Twitter profile. Revoke access at any time. Direct Message Also called a DM and most recently called simply a "message," these Tweets are private between the sender and recipient. Tweets sent over SMS become DMs when they begin with "d username" to specify who the message is for. Favourite To favourite a Tweet means to mark it as one of your favorites by clicking the yellow star next to the message. You can also favorite via SMS. FF #FF stands for "Follow Friday." Twitter users often suggest who others should follow on Fridays by tweeting with the hashtag #FF. Follow To follow someone on Twitter is to subscribe to their Tweets or updates on the site. Follower another Twitter user who has followed you. Following Your following number reflects the quantity of other Twitter users you have chosen to follow on the site.

Geolocation / Geotagging The use of location data in Tweets to tell us where you are in real time. Is also called "Tweet With Your Location." Hacking Gaining unauthorized access to an account via phishing, password guessing, or session stealing. Usually this is followed by unauthorized posts from the account. Users often use the word "hacking" for many things that are not hacking. Handle the username they have selected and the accompanying URL, like so: http://twitter.com/username. Hashtag (#) used to mark keywords or topics in a Tweet. It was created organically by Twitter users. Listed To be included in another Twitter user's list. Listed numbers and details appear in the statistics section of your profile. Lists Curated groups of other Twitter users. Used to tie specific individuals into a group on your Twitter account. Displayed on the right side menu of your homepage. Mention Mentioning another user in your Tweet by including the @ sign followed directly by their username is called a "mention". Also refers to Tweets in which your username was included. Over Capacity Page Users sometimes refer to this page as the "Fail Whale" page. The "Twitter is over capacity" message and a whale image shows up when our site is having trouble keeping up with traffic. Parody To spoof or to make fun of something in jest. Twitter users are allowed to create parody Twitter accounts, as well as commentary and fan accounts. Phishing Tricking a user to give up their username and password. This can happen by sending the user to fake login page, a page promising to get you more followers, or just simply asking for the username and password via a DM or email. Profile A Twitter page displaying information about a user, as well as all the Tweets they have posted from their account. Protected/Private Accounts Twitter accounts are public by default. Choosing to protect your account means that your Tweets will only be seen by approved followers and will not appear in search. Reply A Tweet posted in reply to another user's message, usually posted by clicking the "reply" button next to their Tweet in your timeline. Always begins with @username.

Retweet (noun) A Tweet by another user, forwarded to you by someone you follow. Often used to spread news or share valuable findings on Twitter. Retweet (verb) To retweet, retweeting, retweeted. The act of forwarding another user's Tweet to all of your followers. RT Abbreviated version of "retweet." Placed before the retweeted text when users manually retweet a message. Spam Unwanted messaging or following on Twitter. We work hard to eliminate it. Timeline A real-time list of Tweets on Twitter. See also Home Timeline. Timestamp A note displaying when a Tweet was posted to Twitter. Can be found in grey text directly below any Tweet. Is also a link to that Tweet's own URL. Top Tweets determined by a Twitter algorithm to be the most popular or resonant on Twitter at any given time. Trending Topic A subject algorithmically determined to be one of the most popular on Twitter at the moment. Tweet (verb) The act of posting a message, often called a "Tweet", on Twitter. Tweet (noun) A message posted via Twitter containing 140 characters or fewer. Unfollow To cease following another Twitter user. Their Tweets no longer show up in your home timeline. URL Shortener used to turn long URLs (Uniform Resource Locator) into shorter URLs. Shortening services can be found online. Username Also known as a Twitter handle. Must be unique and contain fewer than 15 characters. Is used to identify you on Twitter for replies and mentions.

Internet abbreviations and acronyms Sometimes called l33tspeak, (pronounced leet-speak), these are terms that are used in online communication. They are popular on Twitter because they help users to express themselves within the 140 character limit. AFK Away From Keyboard. A way of saying youll be unable to communicate for a while because youre off to the fridge. BRB Be Right Back. Essentially another way of saying AFK (above) Facepalm. An expression of weary dismay. Comes from the simply act of holding your head in your hands at yet another avoidable disaster. Headdesk. A more melodramatic version of the above. ICYMI In case you missed it IYCWIM if you see what I mean IMO In my opinion IMHO In my humble opinion. Often unintentionally ironic. LOL Laugh out loud NSFW Not Suitable For Work. A handy warning that the link youre about to open may contain something youd rather IS didnt see. OMG Oh my god POIDH Pics or it didnt happen. Used to challenge somebody making a bold claim, ie. until I see a picture [of thing being boldly claimed] I wont believe it ROFLMAO rolling on the floor laughing my ass off. These days often expressed in a shorter form (ROFL or LMAO) or in creative ways such as ROFLcopter. THIS. Exclam. Usually rendered in CAPS. Used to draw attention to a link or statement with which the user agrees strongly or which they feel summarises their arguments particularly well. WTF a popular and coarse expression of incredulity. The first two words are What The