Tired of Twitter Talk? Me Too!
Sunday, March 15, 2009 at 6:44PM Got this email today from my friend Ben:
Leo, I'd like to propose a challenge.
Next weekend, while you're streaming, refrain from mentioning twitter. Both days. You're viewers and listeners love TWiT, but we're just afraid you have a problem, and we want you to get better. Give it a try?
-Ben
Remember when the iPhone was the big story? People got awfully sick of that. I'm just as sick of talking about Twitter as you are listening to us talk about Twitter. The problem is that Twitter is a big story, and getting bigger all the time. We talk about it because it's one of the biggest stories of the day. I understand if you're bored with it, but we can't ignore stories just because some of our listeners have heard enough about them.
I refer you to the great radio newsman Scoop Nisker, who signed off every newscast on KSAN in San Francisco with the words,
If you don't like the news, go out and make some of your own!
I look forward to covering your great leap forward!
Reader Comments (21)
Pity, I always find complaints of this sort work better when accompanied by positive feedback like
"you talked about twitter but didn't mention foo bar or bletch" :)
Leo, who says you need to talk about only the biggest of stories? Plenty of other sites talk about Twitter too. Pick a smaller story that has the capacity to make a difference and give it a wider reach by telling your hundreds of thousands of listeners.
"Twitter is a big story, and getting bigger all the time. We talk about it because it’s one of the biggest stories of the day"
This is true and I, for one, am very happy about its success and continue to be delighted by the creativity of many apps that surround Twitter. Still, mentioning how many followers one has is considered a faux-pas, a major one at that, and it's not even news for that matter. Correct me if I'm wrong Twitter is not a popularity contest is it?
If twitter is such a big story then why does everyone spend just 20 minutes a day tweeting. If truly twitter was that big a thing you'd find people answering more than once. You'd find them conversing. The conversation isn't there any more. Twitter is nothing but the chewed up bit of track at the end of a bobsled run.
If you're going to be obsessive about something then talk about friendfeed, or event better, talk about facebook. Facebook has 165 million active users, compared to the measly 5 million for twitter. :-).
Twitter is nothing but a sneeze in the park in full hay fever season :-)
Having worked at Nortel in the group that brought TCP/IP to the huge DMS switches back in the late '80s, we constantly struggled for funding because that "Internet thing" was just for universities. Our group was told that TCP/IP was dying and soon to be replaced by OSI. The group broke up and people went on to other things. Meanwhile, Nortel lost a huge lead in Internet technology an scrambled to catch up. Did you know that Nortel was once thinking about, and in a position to acquire Cisco? Where is Nortel now?
A product achieves critical mass because visionaries talk about it in spite of the naysayers. They use the product, they try new ways of using it, they get their friends and family to use it.
I'm not saying that Twitter will be as big as the Internet or even Facebook. But it is a big story because it's on the way up. How can a tech journalist or broadcaster NOT talk about one of the biggest tech stories out there?
it is a pitty... a complaint without a suggestion is just that... a complaint (and who likes to listen to complainers?)
and while i don't really enjoy the twitter talk as much as some other topics, i would much rather get my twitter news and insights from Leo, JCD, et al
Great point!
It's not so much the news stories about Twitter, but the constant obsessing over the number of followers one has. You're an internationally beloved radio, TV, and Internet personality. Your worth is not determined by number of followers on a social-networking site.
What exactly is the "big story" about twitter? I listed to practically everything Leo does and I don't remember ever hearing any "big story" about twitter.
Even if twitter is news, where person X is ranked is certainly not big news.
It feels like sometimes the twitter discussion on Twit takes over the show. And you guys never get around to talking about what happened this week in tech. Twitter is a phenomenon and there are good stories about it. But a whole of hour of an hour and a half show focused just on twitter is ridiculous.
I just would like to say that TWIT itself is a great idea and concept. And Leo has done a great job at creating a platform that appeals to computer geeks and other tech junkies. With that being said, I have went out of my way today to create this account so I could leave a post. I have been complaining (to myself) about how all I hear about is Twitter on ANY of his shows now. For weeks Leo has done nothing but acknowledge the fact that people are tired of hearing about it, and then continues to talk about it. I’m glad that I found TWIT, because it has opened me up to a whole new form of entertainment. But as of today I quit listening to TWIT. I just don’t find any of his shows fun or interesting anymore because of all the Twitter talk. I personally think Twitter is a plain retarded concept, but that’s just my opinion. If Leo wants to use Twitter, then that’s his choice. But talking about it for 50% of a show is just not exciting or fun. I really didn’t like Dvorak when I started listening to these shows. But after understanding his style, I have really come to like him and started listing to his podcasts. He knows that you can talk about Twitter, but eventually MOVE ON to something else. Leo thanks for all the great shows but you have out lived your usefulness to me, and if your not careful you will do the same with your other listeners.
I"m not going to quit listening but it was sad to watch yesterday when at least twice Leo said, "I'm not going to talk about twitter any more" and then went on to talk about it for at least 15 minutes.
I'm not trying to to discourage anyone from listening to him, but you make a great point about it being "sad". Leo it really is this bad. You need to listen to your listeners and not your 100,000 twitter followers. I think your hear them, but your not listening. For me I'm not listening anymore, because its just not entertaining anymore, and most of that is because of all the Twitter.
JRW
So Far The Simpsons have not made any references to twitter on their show. But lately in the pass of couple of weeks TWiT have turn into This Week in Twitter. Twitter has now jump the shark since this mircoblog went mainstream with the Hollywood.
I agree that not much in the way of tech to discuss these days, but please lay off of twitter a little bit, when every story is twitter related it really does sound like "this week in twitter" bring in some more super geek stuff perhaps... Some folks don't like that either but it may fill some time when news is lax. I still think your shows are great, i just agree with JCD bored with recent discussions, they sound like the same old news ro me. Just a thought.....
leo, no offence, when you talk about twitter you whine about it, it makes you seem quite sad.
I have now unsubscribed from twitter oh and the comments about Cali Lewis aren't nice at all, so what if she had differently beliefs than you and why would you want to disown her just because she voted for John McCain.
Sad.
Leo,
You really think Twitter is that big of a story? As big as the Iphone or Windows 7? Sorry but i think the average person doesn't care at all about Twitter. In my opinion Twitter is like Second Life, in a couple years no one will care. I don't know why you cannot see this is not the biggest story in technology. I don't open the newspaper and find that half the technology section is about Twitter, nor do I see that half the stories on Digg are about Twitter. The only place where Twitter seems to have taken over more than half of the technoloogy talk is on the Twit network.
Most people spend half their day on IM, but we don't talk about IM over and over again, we just accept it as a tool. They enjoy SMS and use it daily, but they don't constantly talk about how great it is to use SMS.
Can't you do the same?
Leo, please listen to these people. You are talking about Twitter WAY too much.
I have nothing against Twitter but your near obsession with (talking about) Twitter is very ANNOYING.
-- A regular TWiT and MacBreak Weekly listener.
Leo,
I think it's fair to comment on things like the recent appearance of ads (currently in-house) on the Twitter site, or how Facebook is (supposedly) trying to combat Twitter, but I think you should try and steer clear of drifting into idle chat about the latest Twitter drama or who's got the most followers... those who do care about those things will already know. I'm with John C Dvorak on this one.
Well, Sunday March 22nd's TwiT was another example of Twitter being talked about for 90min. Dvorak wasn't there and I don't blame him. I have loved listening to TwiT and MacBreak Weekly since the start, but from now one, once the twitter talk starts, your "netcast" will be stopped and deleted.
Please Leo, enough is enough.
As previously mentioned, This Week In Tech is becoming more like This Week In Twitter. After listening to the last edition it seems that your guests, although each are noteworthy in their own right, are more interested in who is saying what on twitter rather than talking about the world of technology. We live in interesting, albeit challenging, times. The world is changing, not because of Twitter, but because we are staring at the potential collapse of our financial infrastructure. The possible IBM takeover of Sun barely gets a mention, but the ramifications of this deal if it goes through could have a massive impact on the technology world.
Jason Calacanis is good at explaining the world of finance and VC funding, but when he talks about how he will pay $500,000 dollars to his profile boosted on Twitter, I have to ask myself why? Jason there are plenty of people trying to start their own businesses or keep them running, tech or otherwise. If you have half a mill to burn, surely investing in something with a potential return is better than boosting your own profile, and increasing the funds of the stockholders of Twitter, who I gather have just recently have received a substantial funding contribution.