It can be argued that those of us who tweet links to content on the web are the most annoying of Twitter users. That is the “category” that I fit in, so it makes sense that I would exclude my personal type from this list.
Otherwise, there are probably dozens of other types that are just as annoying. This is, of course, a partial list, but we’ll be expanding the post once more annoying Twitter types come to light. In the meantime, here’s the first 14. Post any that we missed in the comments or tweet at us with your suggestions.
1. The FOREX Spammer
With as much money as people are apparently making on FOREX, it’s amazing that they have time to work their Twitter accounts.
2. The Linkjacker
When you post links to stories, you really should make sure that everyone can see what the story says rather than link to your own site and expect people to click through from your site to the source content. Just a thought.
3. The YELLLLLLERRRRRR
IF YOU TWEET, EMAIL, IM, OR DO ANY FORM OF COMMUNICATION IN ALL CAPS, IT MEANS THAT YOU’RE YELLING WHATEVER IT IS THAT YOU’RE TRYING TO SAY!!!!!! MAKE SURE THAT WHAT YOU YELL IS WORTH YELLING!!!!!!! PLEASE!!!!!!
4. The Twitter Gamer
Unlike many, I have nothing against the games on Twitter like SpyMaster, Mafia, Ninja, whatever. I actually play SpyMaster in the background. However, there’s more to Tweeting than posting your last gaming action. For those not in the game, it can get rather mundane if all you post is who you’ve assassinated, what weapons you’ve purchased, and how we can join your clan/family/ring/dojo.
5. The “Get 100 Followers a Day” Spammer
Have you ever noticed that most of the accounts that Tweet about being able to pick up hundreds of Twitter followers per day only have 84 followers?
6. The Celeb Who Has 2 million People Following their 3 Tweets Per Month
I know. Everyone loves Oprah. You can’t say anything bad about her because she is perfection boxed up into human form. Still, what are her 2 million followers doing? She doesn’t talk to any of them. She rarely tweets at all (going on a month of inactivity). It reminds me of the people who followed Forrest Gump on his runs across the country. They were there, waiting for him to say something magical, and it never came.
7. Porn Spammers
It’s the Internet. Porn is everywhere. Why would anyone go to Twitter to find it? Answer: they don’t.
8. The Repeater Tweeter
These are amongst my favorites. You see them in your stream – the people who have something so important to say that they have to say it over and over again in case you missed it 30 seconds before.
9. The Random Tweeter of the Utterly Mundane
I know Twitter in its purest form is supposed to be somewhat mundane, but some people take it way too far.
10. The MLM Spammer
Everyone has to make a living, and because Twitter is about networking it has become a natural fit for the MLM crowd. That doesn’t make it any less annoying.
11. The Quoter of Witty Wisdom
Some of the best quotes I’ve ever seen came from Twitter. I have been known to throw out some of my faves myself. Still, that shouldn’t be ALL that you tweet, should it?
12. The Super-Fan
Everyone idolizes someone whether they admit it or not. I feel bad and somewhat uncomfortable when I see those who are doing anything they can to get a reply from those they idolize. What will they do if they get a response?
13. The Account Named After A Twitter Action
That’s nice. What are you going to Tweet about? “Following @0boy back because he followed me!”, “Following @soshable back because he followed me, too!”, etc.
14. The Tweeter of the Same Link 500 Different Ways
They have one link they’re pushing. It’s the only thing they will ever tweet about, so if you’re really, really interesting in everything pertaining to that link, please follow these people. You won’t be disappointed.
15. The White Teether
I never knew about this one until @bobf_vstpgh pointed them out to me. Once I did a search, I discovered that there seems to be a growing number of people Tweeting about white teeth! Who would have known?
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I know there are more of them out there. Let me know via comment here, @soshable or @0boy if you know of any other annoying Twitter user types.
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Read more about Twitter on this Social Media Blog.
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Great list, dead on indeed!
Ha! I somehow ended up following all those types.
Half funny, half annoying. The Witty Wisdom guy is the best – at least he tweets variety. (Watch out for White teeth folks – just a new version of MLM.)
@webcastr
darn-my 1st reply didn’t go thru. here goes again:
great list – gets just about everything i’ve seen out there … for sure…
love the ‘repeater tweeter’ for sure… have one of those right now i could name for you in fact
here are some i have noticed too:
use the word moon in a tweet? get an auto reply from obi-wan-kenobe telling you that is not a moon it’s a satellite (i think that is what he says anyway…it happened to me once
use the words oh snap! and get the oh snap! attack robot tweeter retweeting your post
use anything relating to geek/nerd/etc and geekix will retweet that..
use the word “wicked” and there is a reply from a New England Bot in the Boston area letting you know your tweet is wicked good or something to that affect!
i think there are others i’ve seen – but those are the ones that jump to mind instantly for me
@Brandon, @Helen, @Webcastr – Thanks for the comments!
@julie – Great adds. I’ll get them on the update tomorrow.
as much as we’d like to deny it, there’s a bit of all the above in all of us
But then, these guys take it to the extreme, which is annoying .
nice on, jd! yes, the reply bots are beyond annoying too….and i think oprah is the biggest bandwagoner ever.
My favorite is the Self Absorbed Wind Bag—Always bragging about his ranking as a top Twitter user, saying things like WOWSA! Look at Me! Then they’ll crack some lame joke & always has to put the obligatory LOL at the end.
Then there are those Jamokie boys, babbling about some stupid caper…Repeating themselves with the same tired lines…But they’ve got 25,000 followers, so what do I know?
Here’s one you missed: The tweeter who has multiple accounts, all tweeting the same exact tweets, following all the same people. This person often RT’s himself from one account to the other.
I follow a guy who posts wisdom, however it’s his own so that’s a different kettle of fish. But yes, I’ve seen all of these and none are being followed back.
What about people that simply repost links to stuff on Mashable, CNN and other popular feeds that they know good and damn well everyone already follows instead of simply retweeting them.
I hate those Jamokie accounts. And just when I think I’ve blocked them all, here comes another one. I’m surprised they don’t get banned for follower churning.
All those teeth whitener tweets are from RevTwt. Ads on Twitter are just plain annoying. Even if it is a real person and not a spammer.
Wonderful list, but I can’t believe you left out the name droppers. They’re right up there with the MLM link spammers in my opinion. You’ve seen them:
Sitting with @famousguy and @moviestar -going to head to @a-listguy ‘s house now for some dinner with Brad and Angie.
And the braggarts:
Can’t believe I have 1,000 new followers today!
Had great interview about my fantastic product with hot magazine.
Another 2,000 followers? Wow!
Here’s my list: Buzz Off! – Annoying Twitterer Types http://schmorgasboard.wordpress.com/2009/08/17/annoying-twitterers/
Feel free to share them. (Just give credit, please. Thanks.)
Have a great night.
I’m a number 9. Nice post.
I have another one to add… People that tweet “sorry I haven’t been posting for the last 3 weeks. i’ve been on holiday”…. like we were all wondering what had happened to him?! I had to call off the police search when I saw that message. Thank God he’s OK.
My pet Twitter these days are the ones that start into the ‘gift’ DM. It brings the most annoying Facebook app to life on Twitter.
Love it! I would like to add the tweeter who tweets about his intent to unfollow people..I don’t care, just unfollow already.. Or those who think because your tweets aren’t filled with either nothing but emptiness or wisdom, that they not only unfollow, but tweet about it as well..
Great list!
You forgot twitascope, I hate those
Thank you. Great summary of those annoying practices.
But still i read them all. Great post. Should be a warning before you join.
this covers about everyone, so why bother?
What about those apparently auto replies to your tweet that say ‘I’m interested in discussing your views on jaguars’ …and you almost get drawn into a conversation when you check the profile and all their tweets are exactly teh same except for one key word.
Ha! I just got rid of a few of those from my list!
Here’s a good strategy for avoiding these types of Twitter users: don’t automatically follow everybody who follows you. Wow. That was easy. Another tip: keep your friends list under 100. That way you will limit it to people you are actually interested in and be able to actually interact with them in a meaningful way.
How about this one? I just blogged about it not 5 minutes ago. The tweeter posts some garbage tweet and then randomly puts YOUR name along with some other names in it, so it shows up in your @replies. Of course at first, you stupidly go look at their profile, cuz it looks like a compliment. Then, you stop looking at your @replies after awhile, because they’re filled with that instead of conversations.
I’ll try to post an image of it here.
Trying to post a link to the image instead.
Great post, by the way! I’m finding the time/value cost/benefit is starting to fail when I apply that kind of thinking to Twitter, and it’s largely due to the Spam, and some of the types of tweeters you’re posting about.
Lovely @reply spam
I would add people who RT #followfridays where they are mentioned and also people who seem to just list all their followers endlessly for #followfriday. I hate that!
Lisa
Great list, happy to see I’m a nice mix. Guess that means I’m annoying but flying under the radar!
I have been active on Twitter for about a month now and have already all of these annoying types of Twitter users. How do you control you followers more without locking your account and getting all the notifies about new followers?
I’m getting tired of the “I’ve just sent you a [fill in the blank]. You should send me a gift, too!”
Which requires me to turn over my Twitter username and password to ???? so I can pick out something to send back.
Uh, no!
Great list. The funniest things are those that ring true, and these types are all too true! I HATE the repetitive self-promoters – the people who keep sending out the same tweet that links to their own blog which is a self-promotion vehicle (nothing wrong with building a personal brand, but there is such a thing as “thou dost protest too much!”).
Also, there is one exception for #3 – OWEN MEANEY. HE CAN’T HELP HIMSELF.
Great list! How about the cussers? Is there really any reason to cuss in a professional Tweet? No. I don’t follow cussers. And be very careful of your use of “WTF.” It’s WAY overused. In fact, don’t use that either…
Don’t forget those who use a program to show where they are at all times, does anyone care?
Nice post! It’s this type of Twitter pollution that takes the fun away from the rest of us.
I don’t like the bots that keep track of who you are unfollowing like follow monitor. If I unfollow someone its because their tweets usually suck or they are spamming.
Awesome list, have several of these in my follow sections need to weed them out.
HAHA funny, thanks I enjoyed this list. I didn’t read all the comments but to add, I REALLY hate the @hgllesnibiabf accounts that are really listed as “Shelly Ryan” who is really a porn account. She pops up every few weeks as a new @johoibejhrb soon after you block the old one. THAT is SO annoying.
Thanks for your witty post!
Yes! And what about those annoying yet talented New Wave/Post Punk bands who constantly tweet: Follow this link for a great free mp3: http://tinyurl.com/jamtwg
Especially when they then infiltrate blog articles identifying Twitter spam types and try the same trick again. *whistles innocently*
Oh, how I hate those porn, one link and white teeth tweets!
These are definitely some annoying Twitter users. #2 is one of my pet peeves!
LOL
This is hilariously brilliant but what about the “Make Money for Tweeting” schpeal, something has to be done about this..
OMg I just remembered one, if you use 5 in any tweet.. A tweeter willl insult and tell you to shove that 5 where the sun don’t shine..seriously. And it’s in spanish too.. Which is beyond me.
“nodigascinco@SheilaLilybeth ¿cinco? … ¡Pues por el culo te la hinco!
2:45 PM Jul 26th from API in reply to SheilaLilybeth”
roughly translated he’s telling me he’s going to put 5 … in places where 5′s do not belong.
hahahahahahahaha love it! but you forgot the obnoxious self promoting american celebrity i.e. pdiddy i’ll be on mtv at 5pm,
Betheny i’m roller blading by the statue in central park. blah blah blah
I started my twitter account to tweet about my articles. Yep, self-promoter. But I also have conversations with those that I follow and post others’ tweets that ask to be RT’d. Is it really THAT bad?
love it! thank you.
Great list. I won’t follow everyone who follows me, learned the hard way. I made the mistake of following one of those self-promoters/MMO experts until he sent out a tweet to all his followers saying we were lucky to be following him because “I’m smarter and know more about making money than you”. That was enough for me.
Great post, I couldn’t agree more, but wondered where the ads that just SPAM or the magpie accounts simply clogging up the trends are?
Bloody hell! I had no idea people actually tweet those things. Had a good laugh. Brilliant post. Cheers!
hahaha, this is great!
This is so true, you really nailed several of the quirks we discuss.
You should add the Twitterer who provides links to content on the web, but there are two of those, at least.
Some provide value, other’s are simply useless content. Other’s RT without mentioning the RT! Theives
Don’t forgot about those people who simply requote quotes!