I love all forms of social media – yes, even Pinterest, despite my poking fun at it a little too often. But when it comes to playing favorites, I do not hide my adoration for Twitter and disdain for Facebook.
However.
Twitter has its own set of cultural quirks and personal phrases that have sprung up over the years, and it’s time that we properly discuss them.
In my experience, one of the main problems with Twitter is finding a way to describe the euphoria surrounding the consumption of food without sounding completely ridiculous. For instance,
1. “Yes, Please.” – Often used immediately before someone consumes some morsel of goodness (i.e. “Double fudge brownie topped with chocolate ice cream? Yes, please.”), it has simply reached the decent end to its life. Anyone further who uses it? No, please.
(Yes, my son did use this phrase earlier this week. Yes, he meant it ironically.)
2. “Get in mah belly” – This is the term that some are beginning utilize to replace “Yes, please.” It’s frightening, really. I don’t want to think about what food looks like once it’s in yah belly.
3. “Nom Nom” – The preceder of “Yes, please”, and still not okay.
Perhaps it’s my problem. Perhaps I just don’t want to know how very tasty your food feels in your mouth. Perhaps I just need to get over it.
But let’s move on.
4. “Do me a solid.” – Despite its Seinfeld origin, this is an expression that’s just recently wormed its way into Twitter vernacular. And it is BEYOND UNACCEPTABLE, people. If there is anyone in the world that can hear “Hey – can you do me a solid?” without conjuring any images of toilets or worse, then they are LYING. Or just a less soiled person than me.
5. ‘Merica, ‘Murica, ‘Merikah, #Merica, #Murica, #Merikah, and any and all other front-abbreviated forms of America. Freedom is not free, people – and neither was that A that you just hacked. ‘Eorge ‘Ashington is cursing you all from his ‘Rave.
6. #ootd – Really. I’m happy for you that you wear an outfit every day. Or maybe I’m just jealous because there are more days than I want to admit where I don’t change out of my pajamas.
7. “Let me get in you” and “I am in you” – let’s not talk to our beds, baths, houses, cities, or restaurants in this manner. Have you no respect?
8. Tute. I understand that unnecessarily shortening words is a thing to do, but in this case, let’s keep it tutorial. It’s only four more characters – I know you can do it. Let’s go ahead and include in this ban totes, probs, deets, dupes, bestie, and whatevs.
9. Amazeballs. Yes, amazing is overused. No, amazeballs is not the solution. Amazeballs is never the solution.
10. The fact that there is no good spelling for “Whoa.” I cannot hear that word in my head without adding the “-uh” at the end. And “Whoe-Wuh” is not, I don’t think, the sound you’re trying to get from me. But unfortunately, “Woah” is not an acceptable substitution, and despite my love of all things spelling, I can’t find one that works the way we need it to.
11. “This –>” – if that’s all you can come up with to caption your photo, then perhaps you shouldn’t be tweeting it.
12. W00t, Squee, YOLO, and smh. These “words” denigrate Twitter to the status of a seventh grade slumber party. And no matter how much I enjoyed my seventh grade slumber parties (M.A.S.H. and all,) some things are best not relived.
13. Daily sunset photographers. In the words of Martha Stewart, “Who ARE these people?” Do they think we’ve never seen a sky before? Oh wait.
So. Besides me and my sunsets, what is on your Twitter Burn list?
I don’t really use Twitter – but I’ve recently joined Instagram and I just cannot accept people who #use #hashtags #with #every #stupid #word #they #write – I don’t get the point and I just cannot read sentences like that!!!
I do like hashtags when used on Twitter, but the AMOUNT of hashtags people will use on Instagram is confounding to me! I am not a fan.
Hastags drive me nuts. Always have, always will. I don’t get it.
The biggest abbreviation irritation I have is “dupe” (for duplicate). It is all freaking over the place on Pinterest, especially in regards to makeup. As a makeup junkie/makeup artist, I can tell you, there is no “drugstore dupe” for some things. There just isn’t.
Can I have another Pinterest gripe? Bad highlighting and contouring tutorials. I love doing the whole Kim Kardashian highlighting/contouring thing on my face from time to time but I didn’t like it until I found a good tutorial. So many of them are just…they’re just…ugh, if you have an obvious brown streak left on your cheeks and your entire face is a different color than your neck and chest YOU’RE DOING IT WRONG. Okay, I feel better.
I don’t know how to highlight or contour my face, but when I want to learn, I’ll remember not to go to Pinterest.
Redic post guh. Yes please ineed some nom nom. Think I cray, cray? I need a tute to use this thang. Remember I’s luvs ya guh. #cray, cray auntie
Kitty, you are AWESOME.
Posting links to FB – that’s it, just a link to something on FB . . . it’s like someone’s saying “here Travis, let me help you with your social media choices . . . ” – I say “nay” – and click the unfollow button. Wanna link to your blog? Fine. A photo or some words before the FB link? Fine. Just a link to FB? Unfollow.
End rant. Except to say, “totes” is perfectly acceptable if you have a teenaged girl in the house.
We’re working on “crizazlebeans” right now
Agreed. I can’t stand the “…” post on Twitter leading to a full explanation on FB or IG. You must, must, MUST control yourself to 140 characters on Twitter, or we’re just not going to read it.
Let me know how crizazlebeans goes for you.
I don’t do twitter. I don’t even understand twitter. That entire post sounded like a foreign language to me… Except the 7th grade reference to MASH. Technology is slowly leaving me behind and I’m only 30 years old! But I just don’t understand so much of it.
Twitter does take an investment of about two weeks to understand. It’s totally worth it, but I understand when people don’t understand it – because I certainly didn’t for a while.
I’m not on Twitter a lot, so my only real peeve is people who go hashtag-nuts. Unfortunately, I’m guilty of several of your Twitter sins…particularly “probs,” “whatevs,” and “squee.” Mostly because I’m terrible at typing on my phone, so I take shortcuts like those rather than resorting to “ur” and the like. I have never seen an example of #7, and I’m glad. That is downright disturbing.
As long as you’re not saying “ur” and “c”, I’ll forgive your probs. :-)
I have to admit to using “Yes please” a fair amount. But the rest I generally avoid. (I also use WANT… but sparingly.)
I agree with the hashtag-nuts people. Especially people who only use twitter to post their Instagram photos with about 15 hashtags. I have one specific person I follow who does this CONSTANTLY… and if I didn’t know her in real life I would’ve unfollowed ages ago.
I’ve just learned that Instagram caption + photos rarely fit in a tweet – so copy and rewrite for Twitter. It’s the only way.
Can we add #hashtagsnobodyfollows to that? #justanexcuseforleavingoutspaces!!
#Icompletelyagree #Whywouldyoudothat #justuseanormalsentence I can’t even write like that, I always have to go back to delete the spaces that I automatically add ;-)
I don’t mind some hashtag humor, but when it’s not adding any humor or value, I do agree. Sentences aren’t meant to be in hashtags.
I may have pet peeves and nitpickings here and there about Twitter (not too many, though) but my one main, major gripe is that Twitter is so much NOT a conversational place anymore. A few years ago, sure we shared links, but there was so much more talking to each other, too! I definitely miss that.
Interesting. Maybe you just need new friends. :-) I have more conversations than ever on Twitter, but I wouldn’t say they’re controversial. I tend to avoid controversy on Social Media at all costs.
Yeah, every time I do a hardcore cleaning out of Twitter follows and followers, it definitely gets better. And also, for some strange reason, it’s easier for me to see actual conversational tweets on Twitter.com instead of when I’m on Hootsuite. So I still go back and forth between the two.
I’m also not a fan of Amazeballs, and in the blogosphere it’s time is also done, in my opinion. My other Twitter pet peeve is the “Good Morning, how are we doing today.” I don’t need this everyday. I don’t even say good morning to the people in my house everyday. I certainly don’t need a Twitter greeting from someone daily.
Yes! I had a point for the “Good morning” and “Wow!” type tweets, but somehow it got cut. But yes. Say something when you have something to say.
There IS a good spelling for “whoa.” It’s “whoa.”
Do you pronounce the -uh in your head, though? How can you not hear the -uh?
i love twitter but i hate people who attach all their social media accounts together. if you send something (with a million hashtags) from instagram the end of your sentence does not show up if i click the link… you mainly look stupid and i just get mad. don’t do it.
Completely agreed.
Amen, amen, amen. Except whoa–I’m with Jamie on that. And I like your sunset pics. #ootd particularly irritates me, but I don’t follow anyone on my personal account who uses that one.
I don’t use twitter at all. What is wrong with woah? I looked it up, and now I “know” that it is a common “misspelling” of whoa. I have never, in all my reading on and offline, seen woah spelled whoa. Wt*?
Interesting. Perhaps it’s a regional spelling issue? I’m not sure. But I don’t like either one, so…
I do think it is kind of funny that people vehemently hate hashtags, say that they don’t get them, but they don’t use Twitter…where they were invented!!! Of course you don’t if you don’t use Twitter. They are for a real purpose that when fulfilled is actually pretty useful imo. :D
I agree – I am a hashtag enthusiast – as long as they are used in moderation.
I just want to make sure everyone knows that “Get in mah belly” is a Fat Bastard quote from the second Austin Powers movie. That’s assumed, right? That being said, I hate the expression because I can hear the movie line in my head, and it grosses me out.
Also, do you southerners pronounce “whoa” differently than we do up north? I say “woe,” but avoid writing it because “whoa” never seems right, like you said.
I have never seen any Austin Powers movies, so I was not aware.
[Don’t kill me]
And yes, it’s pronounced “woe” down here, too – hence my problem with whoa.
I don’t get the # thing. And ll of the points you mentioned should be banned.
Nom nom = NO NO! It grosses me out and I just don’t know why.
I think that everything posted was very logical. However, what about this?
suppose you wrote a catchier post title? I ain’t suggesting
your information is not good., but suppose you added a post title that grabbed a person’s attention?
I mean 13 Things That Need to be Banned from
Twitter. | Grasping for Objectivity is a little plain.
You could peek at Yahoo’s home page and note how they write article titles
to get viewers to open the links. You might try adding a video
or a picture or two to get readers excited about everything’ve got to say.
In my opinion, it would bring your website a little bit more interesting.