I believe if you look back, there were people a year ago writing and worrying about when Twitter would fall from grace, when the Spammers booted it out of Eden. The question was going to be when, and how.

The more important lesson to be gleaned though is the “why”. What was the moment of critical mass that made Twitter a sudden spam target? Was there a hacker-strategy meeting where it came up? Was it an article about increasing Twitter use? Was there a tutorial that outlined the steps necessary to game the system? Was there suddenly a large enough user-base to make the ROI too tempting to ignore?

I don’t know. And I fear that too many of the analysts and early-adopters are too quick to jump on to the next thing once Eden is lost. They run to the next garden, and never do the autopsy on the previous location.

(ASIDE: While in mid-comment, “buyvitamins” is now following me on Twitter.)

It would be useful to do a comparative longitudinal study to see if there are any common threads to the hijacking of social networks. Let’s see what is part of the natural life-cycle, and separate them from the “asteroids”, the freakish impacts that no one could control nor foresee.

I’m glad you’re seeing value in the tool, even as your use has evolved. Pre-Twitter, I did the same as a frequent commenter on other people’s sites. I count many in this space as good friends, many I have met in person. (and that’s one-on-one in person, not in the sense of a conference or Tweetup.) I’ve shared ideas, learned a lot, and gained experience by lending a hand on projects. I’ve gotten great referrals. I hope Twitter ends up doing the same for you.

I believe Twitter had to acquire a certain critical mass before observant posts like yours would clock any sort of muster. From today’s perspective, the post carries a big stick. But, say, six months ago? Would it’ve?

Imagine you’d written something like this half a year ago — it wouldn’t have registered on the radar screens of most Twitteratti. The experience of using and working with Twitter had to go through several iterations and we all had to iron out our collective tweeting kinks before we knew that it would eventually be colonized by those with ill-er rupute (egs. spammers, sexologists, and other assorted wankers).

I, for one, still sit happily on the bright side of the Twitter fence.

I’ve met **so many** great people whom I otherwise wouldn’t have the chance to. I can’t tell you how this has benefitted…in fact, I’ll be having some face-to-face meetings with several as a result of this, which has been just fantastic. (Maybe we Europeans are a little more trusting of internpersonal relationships in this respect?).

Living here in the middle of Europe, sometimes breathing in the coal-dust inflected air of my former Bloc country, I’d have to say this is a massive boon.

Otherwise a country like the Czech Republic would be tremendously isolated, and that’s indeed counterproductive for any nation, especially one claiming to be a member of the Free World and the EU, more specifically.

To be sure, I’m still firmly in the tweeting camp — like anything else (and which Tim Ferriss so masterfully talks about), you’ve got to learn how to prioritize and parcel out the chaff of your day (Ike’s blog is the complete opposite of that).

Lookit, I don’t read all the tweets in my window — though I reply to all replies! Sometimes you snag a nugget or a big fish, sometimes not.

Luck of the draw, but at least Twitter keeps you in the game.

Thanks for another spot-on insight, Ike. You do this kind of “do” so drippingly well.

–Your bud ADM in Prague

My current follow policy is to follow anyone within my local network and potentially anyone else who sends me an ‘@’ reply. It works for me so far.

As always, your use of social media may vary, and that’s okay

It’s a communication medium. We use it for our own purposes. To expect it to work only as we conceive it is misguided. I *wish* that the spammers would leave us good Twitterfolk alone, but I know it’s unrealistic to expect that they will.

Tweet you later.