Twitter is...

[The below list has already appeared in an earlier post, but people seemed to like it - as such, I thought I'd publish it separately so that people don't have to read through the pro-twitter polemic that originally preceded it. I've added in a few extra points just to make this vaguely defensible as a 'new' post.]

The twitter experience is nigh on impossible to define - it's different for everybody. Here are a few thoughts on what it's been for me:

- twitter is following Stephen Fry, Ashton Kutcher, Lance Armstrong and Oprah because you think you're supposed to, then unfollowing them once you realise they're dull

- twitter is accepting that Richard Bacon is more entertaining than Stephen Fry

- twitter is developing a crush on the funny girl who's probably nowhere near as hot in real life as she is in her profile picture, then discovering that she is, and that she's even funnier

- twitter is sharing an interesting article with people you know will find it interesting

- twitter is getting really really ANGRY about something, and then slightly embarrassed about that self-same anger

- twitter is clicking on a link you know you're going to enjoy just because of the person it came from

- twitter is learning a shitload of stuff that you didn't know

- twitter is not as serious or important as some people would have you believe

- twitter is not a bad thing. Saying twitter is a bad thing is like saying words are bad things. Of course it would be nice if the idiots didn't ever say anything, but the same is equally true of real life

- twitter is wishing Graham Linehan would stop being outraged by EVERYTHING, ALL OF THE TIME

- twitter is an awful lot of really good people who DEFINITELY have better things to do, but have chosen not to

- twitter is wishing Caitlin Moran was, if not your mum, then at least a drunk aunt

- twitter is getting stupidly excited the first time a celebrity @ replies you

- twitter is waking up to the news that Russell Davies is off to the lido. At least, it used to be

- twitter is getting drunk and saying something you regret

- twitter. Makes. X-Factor. Better.

- twitter is many an afternoon lost, but rarely an afternoon wasted

- twitter is NOT where the kids are

- twitter is CAPITAL LETTERS for emphasis

- twitter is the songs from the 80s that you hadn't thought about in years

- twitter is a place where you can appreciate the Backstreet Boys without having to pretend it's ironic

- twitter is a surprisingly evocative diary of days and months past

- twitter is precisely as interesting and as boring, and as frivolous and as serious, as you choose to make it

- twitter is not facebook status updates

- twitter is whatever you make it. Some of these points will apply to you - a lot may not. Let me know what you think in the comments.