Cock-a-Doodle-Do-What?

Social media networking is a train I was late to board. Heck, I didn't even start texting until last year because, under my old cell plan, each text cost 25 cents, plus I still had the antiquated keypad laid out like the phones I grew up with--press 2 three times for a 'c', press 6 eleven times because I kept passing the letter I wanted, etc. Anywho, MySpace came and went without my ever dipping a toe. I finally joined Facebook years after everyone else (Except MBG, who is the only holdout I know, the Luddite.).

Folks piled on the Twitter-go-round when that came along, but I didn't. Facebook was enough social media for me, thankyouverymuch. That changed when my publisher, Crimson Romance, sent me a great crash-course manual on how to be a successful author these-a-days. One of the top recommendations was a Twitter feed. Heavy sigh. OK. Fine. I signed up.

If you want to follow me there, click THIS OBNOXIOUSLY LARGE LINK.

Like a kid wearing swim wings in the shallow end, I nervously paddled right over to the only people I knew how to find, a couple writer acquaintances. Fortunately, another Crimson Romance author, Irene Preston (Whose novel, Infamous, is a super fun, sexy read, by the by), found me and put me on a list with other CR authors. From there, I branched out and spread my wings and mixed some more metaphors.

Having now spent a couple weeks stumbling around the Twitter, I have some thoughts about it. These are they:

I wanted a picture with a bunch of birds so I could make a joke about
all the noise and quacking and clucking on Twitter, but then I found this.
WHAT IS GOING ON HERE? Those birds are huge. Or those people are
tiny. What the heck is that on that one guy's head? He looks like
some naked elf astronaut. And Gollum's in the background all "Wassup!"
at the bushes. This is ridiculous. It's like an illicit Thumbelina fan fic pic,
but it's from the 15th century. What is wrong with you, Mr. Bosch, sir?
I need a hug. 

* Twitter can be scary and overwhelming for someone like me who is socially awkward to begin with. Being a virtual place doesn't change the intimidation factor. In fact, it can make it worse. You can click on the popular kids and see they have tens or hundreds of thousands of followers. Even millions. Starting with zero followers, like the new kid in school, is rough. What do I have to say that anyone would want to hear?

* Twitter moves fast. Like, blink-and-it's-gone fast. And, unless you're one of the popular kids, no one's going to miss you if you don't tweet. You're forgotten. Twitter has the memory span of a goldfish. That means you have to be serious about regularly issuing your 140-character soundbites if you want to stay on anyone's mind, and you have to say something that catches attention.

* Because of the aforementioned need for output, a lot of people tweet links. Lots and lots of links. Links to blog posts. Links to articles. Links to pictures of cute kittens. Links to every dang thing. Now, I'm not above sharing a link once in a while, but my eyes glaze over when I see link dumps (my term for many link tweets in a row by the same Twitter user.). The group of people I follow is still small enough that I recognize the avatars of people who do nothing but post links. When I spot them, I don't even look at their tweets' content anymore. I'm interested in personalities, not advertising. If someone has caught my attention with a great personality, I'm more likely to click when they do post a link. It's like getting a recommendation from a friend versus being inundated with calls from telemarketers.

That golden calf of yours issues manure just like any other cow. Sorry.

* Twitter makes people you admire more accessible than ever before. This is a double-edged sword. On the one hand, it's great to get little glimpses into the minds and lives of writers, industry folks, celebrities, etc. I was thrilled to be retweeted by a well-known comedienne the other day. I preened when a couple well-published romance authors followed me back. This is what networking is all about, baby! Right? Well, maybe. At this point, I don't think I can cash in on "I follow you on Twitter and you follow me, too, so we're totally BFFs and can you introduce me to your agent?" Maybe that happens for some people. I don't know. I've heard magical tales of agents plucking new clients out of Twitter obscurity, instead of from their inbox slush piles, but not regularly enough to make me think it's a viable way to agent hunt.

The dark underbelly of being "closer" to your idols is that you realize they're just people. And people sometimes let you down. They can be offensive or voice support for something you detest, and then you might like them a little less. Their work might be tainted for you. That's kind of sad.

* One perk of Twitter is that you can meet some great people. I connected with author Synithia Williams. We're both signed with Crimson Romance, and discovered we live fairly close to one another. We met for coffee--only to realize we'd met before. Once upon a dream In person, no less. Still, Twitter let us bump into each other again. We had a great chat about our books, the writing life, brainstorming publicity, and our favorite British hotties.

So, that's what I think about Twitter so far. I'll keep plugging away at it. Meanwhile, every time I log in, the birdie logo makes me think about Bob Marley. I can't be the only one.