Read on Twitter
Thread on how I use Twitter
There are really only two rules: birds of a feather flock together and you are who you hang out with.
On Twitter, homophily, love of the same, is based on your interests, the things you find intrinsically valuable to read and learn about. Literal like attracts like.
On Twitter, homophily, love of the same, is based on your interests, the things you find intrinsically valuable to read and learn about. Literal like attracts like.
As on the rest of the Internet, homophily is unrestricted by geography. Because of this, we can kind of transcend the network. It's really easy to move across it horizontally.
Vertical reach is more a function of how many followers you have, and really I've found that it's not indicative of the quality of a person's tweets. Niche accounts can have the best content.
The algorithm tries to predict what you will like, but really liking something is a purely subjective feeling. It doesn't always translate into hitting the like button, and you will always know what you like better than the algorithm because you alone know how you feel.
Most people have a few favorite Twitter accounts. In terms of network distance, the accounts that our favorite accounts reply to and quote tweet, and the accounts that tweet the tweets they "like," are closer to them than people they follow.
What we want to do is find people who our favorites interact with and like regularly. That, at least, is a start.
Network Distance Cheat Sheet (from closest to furthest away)
1. replies to
2. likes
3. mutuals
4. follows
5. does not follow but is followed by
6. neither follows nor is followed by
Ymmv, but I feel like this is accurate. There are obviously more possible situations.
1. replies to
2. likes
3. mutuals
4. follows
5. does not follow but is followed by
6. neither follows nor is followed by
Ymmv, but I feel like this is accurate. There are obviously more possible situations.
What I've found over time is that sometimes I'll wall myself into a section of Twitter, into my own little echo chamber.
The best way to get outside of it is to either search for things that are not currently in your timeline OR to take two people who you really like that are completely different and find out the friends they have in common.
You can do this with Tweetbeaver–it's like figuring out where two roads intersect, except it's Twitter accounts. The fewer followers they have in common, the further apart in network distance. Can also just look at who different accounts follow, see what you're drawn to.
You can also use Tweetbeaver with accounts you do like. What's more, you can take two similar accounts you like but you know you don't have a lot of the type of content they produce in your feed and do the same.
The result is usually a lot of overlap between those two, but if you don't already have a lot of that type of content in your feed, it can open new horizons for you. It's just another way of bursting into a new network and gaining quality content.
Last but not least, you are who you hang out with. Choose carefully, block/mute/unfollow when necessary
