The Ten Commandments For Twitter Users

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  1. Thou shalt never feel obligated to acknowledge a Follow Friday. It’s not a gift, you didn’t win the lottery. You don’t need to tweet back, “OMG, THANKS SO MUCH FOR THE FOLLOW FRIDAY. AGGGHHH!” The only instance in which this would be understandable is if someone like  Kim Kardashian #FF’d you. Homegirl has millions of followers, hello!  She can pluck you from relative obscurity via a single tweet and make you as big as her ass.
  2. Thou shalt never tweet when seriously depressed. Your feed should only reflect the highlights of your life. Use it to only address light topics like vagina waxing, hangovers, and  to report “LOOK AT HOW GREAT MY CAREER IS GOING BYEEE.” type of news. If you’re getting into a #dark place, please log off Twitter. Tracking someone’s nervous breakdown tweet by tweet, while entertaining, is never chic.
  3. Thou shalt always follow Your Aunt Diane—a hilarious Twitter feed that details the adventures of a sexually adventurous hippie/jewelry designer in Santa Fe, New Mexico. And Lindsay Lohan too because every tweet is either a sad pathetic ad she got paid five dollars to promote or some BS excuse for her reckless behavior. Also interesting and terrifying: She recently tweeted at Chris Brown asking if they could meet.  Is she banking on a black eye to resurrect her career?
  4. Thou shalt not live tweet thy entire life. Ex: “7:30 am: gonna start this BEAUTIFUL DAY off with a hike. 9:30 am: Wow! That hike really kicked my butt! Time for sum B’fast with the girls!” 9:45 am: Or maybe not? Traffic is so bad today. Should I take Fountain, my little Tweeties? 10:00 am: Fountain is backed up too. ugh!” Anddddd you get the gist! Twitter breeds this type of obnoxious oversharing but you must resist temptation. Not only will people think you’re annoying for clogging up their feeds, you run the risk of being unfollowed. “OH NO. ANYTHING BUT THAT! What can I do to keep my followers happy?!” You have to play hard to get. You can’t be too desperado.
  5. Thou shalt never tweet while on Ambien, Xanax, or booze. You’ll  tweet 30 times a minute about any topic ranging from the skyline to Christianity and have no recollection of it the morning after. You know what people shouldn’t know about you? Any thoughts or feelings you might have in an altered state. Those gems are only reserved for your BFF’s and the person who is obligated to have sex with you.  The internet isn’t ready for Drunk You. Close the computer, girl.
  6. Thou shalt tweet strange and inappropriate things to celebrities at all times. Isn’t that what Twitter is for—killing your idols and bridging the gap? You know those narcissistic divas are reading EVERY single @ tweet they receive. It’s like masturbation to them. So don’t be afraid. They’re waiting for you. Case in point: I tweeted yesterday, “Is there anything worse than being Billy Corgan?” and lo and behold, he responded with “snore” and is now following me on Twitter. Weirdo.
  7. Thou shalt never bring Twitter into real life interactions. Don’t utter the words, “HASHTAG” when out in public or exclaim, “I’m so gonna tweet that!” when your friend says something funny. It’s best to keep the two worlds separate.
  8. Thou shalt retweet an inane celebrity’s thought once a day. Samples include: “How are y’all doing today? I’m with the kids and we’re going to the movies later. Love me some fam time!”- Britney Spears. Or anything by Heidi Montag or Courtney Stodden. How the hell does Heidi’s tweet about the beautiful sky get 800 RT’s though? They can’t all be for irony. Who genuinely loves these people and/or cares that B. Spears is going to the movies?! America is sick.
  9. Thou shalt take sick pleasure in not following someone back on Twitter. Especially if said person is a peripheral friend and totally annoying. Not following someone back on Twitter is the 2011 way of saying “YOU MEAN NOTHING TO ME. I WOULD RATHER EAT GLASS THAN BE SUBJECTED TO YOUR DAILY THOUGHTS.” But honestly though. If I don’t want to hang out with you IRL, why would I care to read about your day-to-day activities?
  10. Lastly, thou shalt acknowledge that Twitter is superior to Facebook. It’s where grown ups go to be smart and funny. You graduate from Facebook and move on to Twitter. What comes after that? Death. Or maybe having children and being too busy for the internet. Whichever comes first, you know?

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