How to Twitter

You’ve been listening to people talk about it for months, and now you want to jump on the bandwagon and learn to Twitter. Well the first thing we need to do is get your lingo right. Twitter is the website. What you do on it is called “tweeting.” You tweet, I tweet, he tweets, we have tweeted (although there are some rather colorful debates regarding what the past participle of “to tweet” really should be). Regardless, you want to know how to tweet or how to use Twitter (unless you’re talking about imitating bird calls, in which case, this is not the article for you).

When you sign in, Twitter takes you to your home page. At the top, there’s a box. Type in it, and click “Tweet.” There you go. You’ve just tweeted. Say whatever you like in 140 characters or less.

If you want to mention someone or speak to them publicly, simply type their username directly behind “@.” For example, to send a public message to Dolly Parton, type “@Dolly_Parton” followed by your message.

It is not likely that Dolly Parton will return your message, but hey, now that you know how to twitter, er, tweet, anything is possible.

Twitter Glossary

There are a few words and acronyms you ought to know before we go any further. Knowing these will help you navigate the Twitterverse safely and without too much confusion. A basic knowledge of Internet and texting abbreviations will also prove extremely helpful.

• DM (noun/verb) - direct message, a private message sent between mutual followers; to send a private message to another Twitter user
• RT (verb) - re-tweet, to re-post a public message posted by another Twitter user, giving credit to the original author
• Tweeps (plural noun) - Twitter peeps (people), those one considers friends or colleagues on Twitter
• Tweet (noun/verb) - a short message, post or update made publicly on Twitter; to post a short message or update on Twitter
• Twitterverse (noun) - the world of Twitter; the society that exists on the social media website known as Twitter

What Is Twitter?

Now that you’ve got your vocabulary straightened out, let’s talk about what Twitter is. Twitter is a social media network – a website where billions of people can connect and share ideas no matter who they are or where they live. Members post messages of no more than 140 characters, sharing everything from what they had for breakfast to breaking world news.

How to Join Twitter

Anyone can be (and probably is) on Twitter. From the average Joe to the president of the United States, all it takes is a few clicks for anyone to log on.

When you go to the Twitter home page, you’ll see a button that says, “Sign Up.” Clicking it takes you to a form page where you’ll put in your name, your desired username, your password and your email address. Then click “Create my account” at the bottom of the page, and voila! You’re in!

An email will be sent to the address you provided simply to confirm that you are a real person legitimately signing up for an account. There will be a link in the confirmation email for you to click, and doing so completes the sign-up process.

How to Find and Follow People

Once you’ve signed up for a Twitter account, the next thing you’ll want to do is find some people to follow. Again, go to the Twitter home page, and at the top, click “Sign in.” Enter your username and password to sign in.

Now look at the top of the page. Find the button that says “Find people.” This page has four tabs:

• Browse Suggestions: Clicking on this tab brings up a list of topics. You can select a topic that interests you to find Twitter users who tweet about that topic. Each category brings up a list of users with a mini-profile and a “follow” button. Click the “follow” button to begin seeing that user’s tweets on your home page.
• Find Friends: This tab allows Twitter to search your email contacts for registered Twitter users. If your friends have registered for Twitter with an email address that you have in your contact list, Twitter will find them for you. Then you can decide whom you wish to follow and click the “follow” button by their names. Twitter can search the contact lists of Gmail, Yahoo, AOL and LinkedIn accounts.
• Invite By Email: If your friends aren’t already on Twitter, you can type in their email addresses here to invite them.
• Find On Twitter: If you already know a friend’s username, simply type it into the box, and click “Search.” A list of possible matches will appear. When you find the one you want, click the “follow” button to begin following that person.

Now that you follow people, when you sign in, you’ll see a page full of updates from all your friends, and if they follow you back, they’ll see your updates on their home pages.