I’ve been getting into Stumbleupon a lot more recently (I know, I know, I’m like 4 years late to the party) and am beginning to see the potential for it to drive more than just “junk traffic” to a site. You can check out my profile here, go ahead and add me as a friend if you’d like!

I’ve been watching, bewildered, for a while now as Twitter continues to grow in popularity. I signed up a few months ago, even bothering to add the Tweet box to the side of this blog, but watching the way it was used, I decided straight away that I didn’t want to be part of the community until I at least knew some Twitter users in “real life”. As it happens, I have still yet to meet a single person outside of the SEM circle that even knew what it was, let alone used it on a regular basis.

However, amongst the SEM regulars, it seems to have become huge. And still it sucks, due to the sheer inanity of 99.99999999999999% of updates posted. I just don’t understand where you people are finding the time. Even after reading articles explaining the virtues of Twitter and about how it can be modified to “spice it up“, I’m still convinced it’s really only good for a) low-grade advertising and b) talking shite.

Speaking with Neil from Lucidite, I realised perhaps I’m not the only one thinking this way. Here’s the top 21 reasons why we’re thinking Twitter Is Bullshit.

1. I honestly couldn’t care less what you had for your tea, or how that sensitive medical problem is going. Neither do most of your followers, really.
2. The most followed ‘tweeters’ already have well establised blogs that they post on daily. However, not content with expressing a daily opinion on these blogs, now we’ve got to follow them minute by minute. They are that important and interesting.
3. Some ‘tweeters’ are ‘tweeting’ everyday hoping to ‘get in’ to the z-list Celeb list, then passive aggressively whining about it when it doesn’t happen.
4. “We feel that Twitter keeps us on the ‘cutting edge’ of the web marketing sphere - shit, where’s the past 2 hours gone…”
5. Asking to ‘follow’ someone is rather like a request to stalk them, especially if you’ve never met.
6. It is instant messaging for voyeurs and exhibitionists.
7. Spending over $200 on texting ‘tweets’ does not make you cool.
8. Just because you’ve got 30 ‘followers’, doesn’t mean you’ve got 30 friends.
9. When I do exactly the same thing on Facebook, my real friends get to read it.
10. Even though you’ve got nothing to say, 140 characters never seems enough to say it.
11. Just because you feel like you’re hanging out with A-list bloggers, doesn’t mean they’re aware you exist. Chances are they can’t even read your replies.
12. Even if they can read your replies, it doesn’t mean they will.
13. And for that matter, why do you care so much about what is going on in their minute to minute life?
14. In real life, it’s usually considered impolite to start banging on to relative strangers about how your day was before they’ve even asked. Why is this so different on the internet?
15. The size of your penis is inversely proportional to the number of people you follow. Jason Calacanis follows over 22,500 people. I follow none.
16. Most of your followers are fickle sycophants basking in your reflected internet-glory. You might be feeling the love right now, but you know eventually someone better will come along. Then you’ll be left ‘tweeting’ into the ether.
17. Just ‘cos you work on the internet, and Twitter happens to be on the internet, does not mean Twitter is work.
18. It’s a DOS version of the Matrix.
19. Using Twitter effectively can be a quick route to becoming an ‘Internet Rockstar’. Being an ‘Internet Rockstar’ as rather like being a regular rockstar minus a few important aspects, namely a) the talent, b) the money and c) the sex.
20. If people spoke in real life the way they write their ‘tweets’, the world would be a bland and inoffensive place indeed.
21. No matter how much you love it right now, face it, you’ll have forgotten all about Twitter just as soon as something better comes along. Following current trends, I can only assume that this will be some sort of wireless application to stream your innermost thoughts directly from your brainspace. Come on, admit it, you’d love that, wouldn’t you?

…just lazy.

For those of you that have been stopping by over the past month only to be crushed to discover I’ve not added anything for a while, sorry guys! I have been pretty busy recently, but I’ve not given up on this place - whenever something catches my eye while I’m crossing the webs for research and link building, I’ll be posting it here, along with the occasional rant.

The SEO world is a crazy place of best guesses - sometimes educated, often wild - and with SO MANY bloggers writing daily about SEO, it can be difficult to get on the bleeding edge of a particular story or method, and if you catch it more than a few hours after the news breaks there’s really no point in posting, lest you be accused of copying someone else’s work. So if the SEO-related posts seem a little sporadic it’s because a) I was busy working & missed it until every man and his SEO dog has blogged about it, or b) SEOMoz has already said it, then repeated it in 6 more  blog posts, far more eloquently than I’m likely to manage.

I do plan on picking up the pace on my music blogs - when I get the chance  I’ll tell you why I’m looking forward to this year’s Leicester Summer Sundae so much, for example.

For now I give you one of my new favourite sites - The Internet, Now In Handy Book Form. Enjoy Crackbook and Porn By Girls For Girls and more.

Back soon!

…but have you got a Semmy for it?

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Came across this on YouTube today, an introduction to Wordpress blogging and comment moderating. Definitely worth a watch if you’re interested in starting a blog of your own - which I’d recommend, especially as part of a larger site. So long as a site’s blog is regularly updated it can really help the overall SEO, providing the search engines with fresh content to gobble up, and if the blog is on topic it’ll usually also provide opportunities for targetted cross linking. For example if your site deals with doll’s houses and you write a blog on the subject of miniature baths, you could link “miniature baths” through to a relevant page. I’ve even seen plugins that will automatically link mentions of specific keywords through to the relevant page on the site, making it even easier to take advantage of blog posting. Read more

Like the total blogging noob I am, I only just realised that nofollow was being applied to all the links I place to external sites in any posts - AS STANDARD!?! Of course, this just will not do! Read more

A couple of weeks ago Julie Joyce, one of the SEO Chicks, tagged me to write a meme - 4 Ways to Improve the SEO Chicks blog. Of course, having been writing this blog for a whole 2 months, with a total of 13 posts, I am already a blogging master, and so they are right to ask my opinion. Indeed, it’s only taken me 16 days to get round to responding to the tag… when I’m as topical and on the ball as that, you just know you have to listen to what I have to say. So here goes…
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