The UnSub

I started the service with the intention of tweeting (aka micro-blogging nowadays bo eng to write long posts) to a Singapore number instead of the UK official number. It started with a handful of people like 20 or so until I experimented with appending viral URL address to members’ updates.

Lo’ & behold, let there be buzz! And by some weird chance, StraitsTimes covered an article titled “Blogging is dated…” covering Twitter and there was small mentioned of twitter.sg. Visits boomed but I believe it is transient. Nonetheless, I conclude newspapers are powerful media. I also didn’t want to take chances of getting a lawyer’s letter from Twitter for infringement (thanks to @brainopera for the reminder), so I move the service to a new domain: Tweet.sg

The short traffic boost brought some interesting people to my attention. Particularly, someone wants to buy my system but feels a SGD$250 modem is too expensive. Another asked if it is possible to have 2 mobile numbers updating a single Twitter account (yes doable) and insisting in his correspondence “We should solve this together” which actually means “do it for me” (it didn’t work because of his own typo). A nicer chap asked the reverse, possible to have one phone updating two different Twitter accounts (sorry no).

Most of the folks are really supportive (special thanks to @sivasothi) except for one who tweeted “Are you stealing my password or spying on my messages”.

I told him to fuck off if he thinks so highly of his account or if his password could lead to his ATM account.

I don’t feel bad telling people off because it’s my system and system descriptions are clearly written. If you have dyslexia (which Twitter may be better for you than a standard blog) or read and not believe, it is your problem. This post can be thought of as a form of self-serving justification but frankly I don’t give a shit.

In retrospect, to “spy” on someone in Twitter is really easy, just open up a browser and type:

http://search.twitter.com/search?q=@twitterIDyouWannaSpyOn

You will see all tweets replied to that person and if you click on the ID, you see his/her timeline entries.

Oh, did I mentioned that all updates (except for direct messages) are viewable in public timeline too? Duh!

My deepest apology for this post that definitely exceeds 140 characters and cannot be Tweeted. So who said that blogging is dated?! It has just gotten faster and shorter with Twitter.

P.S. I am not trying to sell Twitter so that I can get a developer job. Twitter is not even sure of how to monetize, join sure retrench one.

What seems easy to use may not be easy to design. Unfortunately, you will still have to deal with idiots.

Dumb user