I recently discovered that someone I’d been following here for a couple of years, unfollowed me. No, it’s not the first time this has happened (nor will it be the last). And yes, I keep tabs on this stuff every once in a while, as I take who I follow fairly personally. I like to think of the people who I routinely engage with here as friends. Or, as close to friends as you can get without physically meeting. Anyway, I was a little shocked by the unfollow, so I asked him why he did it. His response was that he didn’t think I really cared very much about Twitter anymore. And then I was like, ‘wha??’ I’m sorry, I missed the memo on much you’re *supposed* to care about Twitter. I guess I care as much as the next guy, but probably not as much as some other people. The fact I’m here at all proves that I care at least a little bit. Then it dawned on me how little me and this person actually communicated since the days of the epiphany when we were all giddily walking around just happy to collide with each other. Global reciprocal communications in real time was very shiny back then.
So the correspondence I had with this person made me think about the idea of reciprocal following and friendship here. I believe there’s a huge difference between someone who is a friend, and someone who is just a friendly social acquaintance. I think most of us like to believe that we’re friends with the people we follow and who follow us back, but are we? Admittedly, I fall victim to this as much as anyone else. For example, there are several reciprocal follows I have on Twitter with people who have massive audiences and who are highly engaging, but who have never once in all the time I’ve been in this space just randomly responded to something I’ve tweeted. Sure, they’ll sometimes reply to me after I reply to them about something they’ve pushed out there, but that doesn’t mean they’re my friend. That just means they’re friendly people. Generally.
Ok, stop – before you get any further, understand that this is my personal opinion and that because there are no rules here, everyone is welcome to manage their affairs the way that works best for them. If you want to follow 50,000 people – great. That strategy just doesn’t work for me. I care too much about sincere connections. And don’t get me wrong, it’s cool to get a reciprocal follow from one of the popular kids, and it’s fun to chat with them when they reply to you. But there’s a big difference between being social with someone, and actually being their friend.
How do I recognize friends? I pay attention to who replies when I push content into my stream. And not just the big important stuff I push either. The stupid stuff too. When someone routinely identifies with me about my regular life stuff, these are the people I usually follow. Because these are people I’d likely be friends with in real life. Not that this isn’t real life – but you get what I mean.
How do I try to be a friend? Next to talking to the people I always talk to, I spend time every day looking into my stream to reply to people who I don’t routinely talk to. I’ve gotten away from the shiny new phase of Twitter, and use it a lot differently now. I simply don’t have the time to read through every tweet in my stream. But I do try to reply to people every day who I don’t routinely engage with (and I’m not talking about replying only to the popular kids, either.) The way I see it, there was a reason I followed someone in the first place. Sometimes all it takes is a random reply to something they’ve pushed, to reconnect.
My point is to be friendly here – but don’t expect a person with tens of thousands of followers to really know that you exist just because you get a reciprocal follow from them. That is unless you engage them directly. And even then, they won’t know the stupid stuff about you because there’s no way any human being can see everything in their stream.
Friends. Over the course of a lifetime, they’ll come and go. But the ones who matter most tend to stick around. And they almost always know the stupid stuff about you. They pay attention.
***
Nichole Brown
Feb 22, 2011
How timely. I am in the process of writing (read: thinking about writing) a post about when acquaintances become friends. What has to happen to move a person to the friend column. The circumstances do vary, but there must be some common factor. Especially on Twitter. There are people on there (you being one) who I consider friends. though I’ve never met, or met only once or twice. Then there are people I’ve hung out with several times socially who will remain an acquaintance. Perhaps, it’s what you said at the end… it’s the people who pay attention who become our friends.
kellimarks
Feb 23, 2011
I struggle with this too. There are the people you WANT to be your friend. The people who are your friends. And the people who want to be your friend. With Twitter we (or at least I know, I) swim concurrently in both a big pond and a little pond. Sometimes the popular people are people in my industry with bigger, more important jobs and sometimes they are locals that have more influence. I find myself being very self-centered at times on Twitter (impossible to not be, of course) but I do try to engage others when they put something out there. Sometimes they reply, sometimes they don’t. It’s all just learning.
coreyanderson
Feb 23, 2011
Jimbo, thanks for writing this post. In changing careers I havent found much time to keep up with my blog. So, I appreciate you writing words the rest of us can agree with. Well, maybe not all of us bit I really identify with these particular words in his particular order. Thank you.
yarby
Feb 23, 2011
Good stuff Jim, glad to have finally met you in person. Looking forward to continued interaction and getting to know you.
SuzanneVara
Feb 23, 2011
JimI love this post (ok I think I always say that) but really you hit a part of friendships and being friendly. I am friendly with many but I am friends with a handful. You really captured the difference at the end with friends pay attention. This is so true. If I not around for a time in the afternoon or evenings when I always am, I am greeted with some DM’s asking if all is ok or if I am working on something that I might need some help with. Those are my friends that know when I am active and when I am on down family time. I think we all break that barrier and sometimes throw around friends as it is easier than saying “meet Jim, someone I am friendly with” – no , we say, “meet my friend Jim.” It is clunky to say it the first way. Although in some circles it is clearly defined who friends are – this is a friend of mine or this is a friend of ours, but that is an entirely different conversation.Our usage of twitter is OURS. I use it my way and you use it YOUR way. Sometimes we collide and learn from one another but at the same time I do not see you calling certain football players a dumb ass over a bad play. I also do not see you boasting about your #mancrushes. But I do see you engaging in some conversations sharing your POV. I like that we can all use it the way that we want. If someone unfollows me that I really like, yeah I am hurt by it as what the hell did I do or say? It is an awful feeling sometimes. Then I look at it and say were we friendly or friends? Friends would rech out and tell me where those that I am friendly with back door it and unfollow without a mention.
Amanda R.
Feb 1, 2014
This is something I come across regularly in real life in China. Chinese students do not seem to understand the difference between Westerners being “friends” and just being “friendly” and it can lead to some awkward situations and hurt feelings. Daily, students will walk up to me say “Hi! Can I be friends with you?” How can I answer that? Friendship is something that takes time to cultivate, not automatically given just because I stopped to say “hi” and let you have my QQ number. Sometimes #friendlinessbitesback.
My novel – Minor King
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