I’ve had my problems with Twitter. There can be no debate from me on this point, no backpedaling or hedging; I have said some hateful things about the service. However, I lack the aptitude required to be a truly effective holder of grudges. My hate burns like flash paper, – a quick burst that leaves no residue.

My opinions are ultimately meaningless; but there are others out their who dislike Twitter in a deeper, more passionate way. Often, I see their concerns brushed aside with a kind of disdain usually reserved for dismissing the concerns of the elderly. This is a shame, since the one thing nobody wants to see is an argument on the Internet.

I did not come here to bury Twitter – nor to praise it, either. But has there really been enough analysis of the different ways that people are angry about Twitter? Doesn’t that anger deserve classification?

Bitter skepticism

Looking into the arguments of some Twitter critics, it’s clear that they don’t so much hate the service itself, but rather they hate the hype surrounding it. Certainly there’s a case to be made that Twitter’s most vocal supporters are directly responsible for a lot of the hate that’s directed at it, because even though some might find their vehemence infectious, many others find it irritating. According to some, Twitter is: a break-through communications platform; a world-changing social networking tool; a vital and un-ignorable marketing venue; the savior of journalism, and so on.

Talk like that tends to piss people off. Nothing ever lives up to the hype, they say, and frankly believe that anyone who allows their own speech to veer off into the hyperbolic stratosphere when they should know better is being dishonest. To the Twitter skeptic, it’s just the latest in another long line of Things that are born, promise to change the world, and then recede into the background of our daily lives with not too much disruption. This is what they know is going to happen; this is moment they are sick and tired of waiting for, and they resent having to endure the predictable hype-phase that these Things inevitably go through.

Twitter now or you will pay

A subset of the reaction against the hype is the sense that Twitter is a looming obligation for people who rely on social connections to generate income – freelancers, consultants, and the like. They already have a plethora of contacts to maintain in various ways; by email, phone, social websites. It’s no wonder that they would resent having to invest their time in yet another method of contact, on the off chance that it might pay off. The problem is that joining Twitter because you feel you have to can lead to being surly about it. If you find yourself replying to requests with, “I don’t want to be your friend, unless you can help my career,” this might be you, and you might be making a mistake.

Still, nobody likes to be forced into anything, especially if they are under a lot of pressure to compete for limited resources. Pro baseball players probably feel the same way about steroids as many freelancers now feel about Twitter. “Dammit, I hate having to do this, but if I don’t I’ll never work again!”

Effect on conversation

Some are disturbed by the influence Twitter has on how we talk to one another. With a chattering class already primed by concerns over the lack of civility on the Internet, this vector of dislike had a built-in foothold in many people’s consciousnesses. Shortness has its place, of course, but it’s not the right tool for every job. Unchecked curtness can lead to oversimplification, essentialism, or even a brutal lack of subtlety; by filtering nuance out of its collected epistles, Twitter often appears to be encouraging the excesses of pithiness.

I could easily sympathize with this point of view. As you may have noticed, my written voice might best be described as florid; this is largely due to the fact that I tend to over-write as a way to disguise the fact that I have no point to convey. But there must be some folks out there who are wordy to good effect, and I can understand how, to them, Twitter represents everything they stand against.

Of course, if you’re really concerned about potential threats to conversation, may I suggest donating to your local marajuana eradication program.

Value-free content

Some critics have ventured into the deep recesses of Twitter in search of content they might find valuable, and have returned with nothing. Mere status updates they find banal; pithy bon mots, insufficiently clever or lacking appropriate context; fake celebrities, republished novels, broken poetry, and other stunts, too easy and too desperate for any kind of attention. Unable to perceive any worth in the content, these critics begin to despair at the waste of time and effort that mountain of text represents.

The fact that people engaged in trifling pursuits are likely only distracting themselves from other trifling pursuits (rather than works of great substance or merit) does nothing to assuage the critics’ irritation. Given the volume of Tweeting alone, surely their must be some potential that’s being wasted in that mass.

Twhat’s twin twa tw-name?

It’s also entirely possible that some people’s hate originated with the name and just spiraled out from there. Twitter, as a word is all right, if a little twee(t!), but it’s inspired an epic rise in related neologisms, portmanteaus, and puns. And the worst of these are the puns, because people often have an irrational, passionate hatred of puns. Yet nobody could resist them, or so it seemed for awhile. We haven’t seen this level of precious nomenclature since the advent of the word “blog”. (And, incidentally, isn’t it interesting that just as blogs were reaching widespread recognition, we went through a boom in the use of the word “precious” as an insult?)

My own problems

Nothing I’ve said here is intended to either validate or discount the various classifications that have been mentioned. Nor is this post intended to be an exhaustive list – I can’t realistically imagine that anybody’s motivations are so simplistic as I’ve represented them here. Really, it’s more of a preliminary look at some major themes that have arisen in the critical response to Twitter. The charges laid by any of these types of dislike have no doubt been answered, restated, asked again, modified, and so on.

As for myself, I’m still no great fan of Twitter. But, I’ve let the hate go. I’m slowly coasting to the middle-ground on the issue – I have my doubts about whether I’ll make it much past the center-line, though.

I am generally unsociable; I tend to avoid social media, therefore. Twitter is social media. Ergo, I will probably avoid Twitter. Signing up simply to follow an established Twitterer is unlikely to happen until I find someone whose tweets I simply must read every day. And while certain heroes of mine may be Twittering, even they cannot convince me. What do I find on their feeds? Chiefly conversations with other Twitterers.

Which is fine, but I still feel weird about this sort of thing — it feels like eavesdropping, to me. This could be the perfect opportunity to engage with people that I like and respect, but even there I find no purchase. There is nothing I have to say that could possibly interest John Scalzi; there is no pithy observation I could make that would justify the attention of William Gibson; there is no sentence I could construct that would be worth Ed Champion’s time to read.

I’m not saying that they (or anybody else) shouldn’t be tweeting. They obviously gain something from it, and that’s great. It’s just that I don’t dig it myself, and have nothing to add, no contribution to make.

I just hate to see instant dismissiveness crop up when there doesn’t seem to be much reason for it.