A beginner’s guide for online and print journalistsBy Josh Shear, syracuse.com

OK, I joined Twitter. Now what?

Tweeting/Twittering: Creating a message to be sent via twitter

Following/Unfollowing: Having someone’s messages come straight into your Twitter stream.

@reply: Lets people know you’re having a conversation or responding to a thread. Use @UserName for this.

DM = direct message. A private message. Use d UserName for this (the person must be following you to see a direct message from you).

Hashtags: Use #YourTag. More on this later.Stream: The list of other people’s updatesTweeps/Tweeple: Peeps/People who use Twitter.

The lingo: Things you need to know

You can follow people to read what they have to say

People can follow you to read what you have to say

It’s an exchange of ideas, if you will

What's this "following" deal?

Go to their Twitter page and click the follow button. Come on, people, this is Twitter, not brain surgery.

How do I follow someone?

Log in, go to their Twitter page, and use the handy dandy little “block” button. It’s good for bosses, parents, siblings, spouses, stalkers…you get the picture.

What if I don't want someone following me?

You’ll get an e-mail. Unless you gave Twitter a fake e-mail address in the first place. In which case, you’ve only hurt yourself. Twitter has a few hundred thousand regular users. They’re not gonna check on you. If you want to know who’s following you, give them a real e-mail address. That’s all.

Cool. But how do I know if they're following me?

What you should really do is read the “Who should I follow?” slide, which is coming up next, you impatient ingrate!

If someone follows me, do I have to follow them back?

Friends, family and colleagues

People who write about your industry and interests

Celebrities

Random strangers

Who should I follow?

Don’t feel obligated. Seriously. If you work in a large company, you’re not going to know most people, and most of them aren’t that interesting (just sayin’).

You can pull aside what they’re saying in a separate group (see the upcoming section on tools, and sorry I keep getting ahead of myself here).

Personally, my Twitter account bears my name, not my company’s. Therefore, it’s mine, and I’m going to follow who I want with it. </harping>

Following friends, family and colleagues

We’re in a unique industry, and Twitter’s in roughly the same industry we are, so following people who write about your industry is a good networking opportunity, and a good way to know about the evolution of what you do.

Some industry users I’d recommend (www.twitter.com/...): jayrosen_nyu, cshirky, guykawasaki, whitneyhess, alanataylor, suzanneyada

NunesMagician, live315, and amanda_nan are among those who regularly complain about the state of SU basketball

Following people who write about your industry and interests

I’m about the exact opposite of a fan-boy, so I don’t follow any celebrities. But I know that Britney Spears, John Mayer, MC Hammer (seriously), Ryan Seacrest and Shaq are all on Twitter.

OK, I’ll admit it. I followed Hammer for a bit. He’s a smart dude, writes a lot about Amber Alerts, parenting and that kind of stuff.

Following celebrities

Start going through the lists of who the people you’re following are following. You might find new interesting people.

Also, I like Twubble (crazybob.org/twubble) for recommending new people based on who you’re following (requires your Twitter user name and password, but it’s safe)

Also, if you see someone writing about something interesting, try following them for a while.

Following random strangers

Some people follow back everyone who follows them. Which is why some people are following 11,000 people or more. They’re not reading everybody. Promise.

Feel no obligation to follow someone back. If they can’t take the rejection, they shouldn’t be on Twitter.

Following people back

Go to their Twitter page and click on the spot where you’re following them. You’ll be asked to confirm that you want to remove them.

Unfollowing people

If they’re using a service like Qwitter (useqwitter.com), it will e-mail them, and tell them what the last thing they said before you unfollowed them.

Only narcissists and people who make money from having followers care if you unfollowed them.

Will someone know if I unfollow them?

You should use Qwitter (useqwitter.com) to find out if someone unfollowed you

Use twitter.grader.com to find out how you rank among other narcissists (I’m in the top 2.5% of narcissists at this writing).

Use twitalyzer.com to measure your impact. I’m slowly developing, but most of clout is growing.

Use twitterank.com to measure how popular you are. I’m something like 76th percentile, so I’m not hermitting well enough for my tastes.

Wait a minute, I'm a narcissist

FTW! = For The Win!FAIL = something failedOTOH = On the other hand…OH = OverheardOHAW/OHAO/OHATO = Overheard at

work/at the officeIMHO = In My Humble Opinion.

Note: You’re on Twitter giving your opinion. This is pretty much the opposite of humble. Just an FYI there.

WTF? Commonly used expressions

Hashtags are the accepted way to aggregate information using hashtags.org, search.twitter.com or other places (via RSS)

Follow Twitter user hashtags to have your tags recognized for hashtags.org.

Use #tag as a format. Examples might be #ica09 for a conference, #superbowlads for Super Bowl ads, etc.

We aggregate #cny and #syracuse at syracuse.com/twitter, using a reblog

Some hashtags aren’t actually hashtags. They’re just someone being a jackass. You’ll recognize it quickly.

Hashtags

Twitter allows 140 characters, but some URLs are really long. I prefer http://is.gd as a URL shortener; some people use others. You’ll see them in your stream.

Shortening URLs

Facebook offered Twitter $500 million for a buyout. Twitter told Facebook to go screw. Facebook’s new design is kinda like Twitter, except threaded. Coincidence? I think not.

Twitter can updatee your Facebook status – either all your tweets (apps.facebook.com/twitter) or select ones via a #fb hashtag (apps.facebook.com/selectivetwitter)

Seeing Twitter, now I get the new Facebook! (Right?)

Fear not. Here are some better ways to read Twitter:

Twitterfox: A browser-based plug-in for Firefox.

Twhirl: A standalone application. It’s losing market share because it’s only pretty good.

Tweetdeck: Everyone loves Tweetdeck. Seriously. If you’re not looking specifically for a browser-based solution, use Tweetdeck. You can sort by groups, search for stuff and all that jazz.Note: Tweetdeck is not paying me. Maybe they

should. @reply them and tell them so.

twitter.com/home sucks. There has to be a better way to read updates

Twitter has an OK mobile site at m.twitter.com. I prefer it for reading, but not for tweeting.

Text: If you set up your mobile in “Devices” under “Settings,” you can tweet via SMS – just remember you have a 140-character limit, not 160.

Blackberry: I suggest using Twitterberry. It’s good, not great, but keeps improving as it goes (it’s not even at version 1.0 yet). Check out orangatame.com for more on this.

iPhone: People seem to prefer Twitterific, although there are multiple apps.

Twitter for mobile

Twitter is open to developers. All kinds of people are making all kinds of applications. Check them out, see if you like them. If you do, be sure to pass them along so I can benefit from your action, despite my laziness.

APIs

I tell people to think of Twitter like a river. It’s always there, and always moving. You’re never going to see all of it. Ever. And it’s never going to be exactly the same when you see it the next time. Ever. Just see what’s there while you’re looking at it, and if there’s selected content you want to look up, you can go back and either search for it, or look at the page of the user whose tweets you want to read.

Appendix A: I can't read all of this stuff. I'm getting ready to quit.

Seriously, people. I’m interesting, helpful, and a narcissist. Follow me at twitter.com/Josh_Shear.

Appendix B: Follow me