How to fix SXSW Twitter barf syndrome
Today is the first day of SXSW in Austin, TX, one of the most anticipated conferences of the year and has thus far been one of my favorites.
When I travel, especially to conferences I love to barf content on Twitter. Don't be mistaken, barf is exactly what it is. It's partly how the name of my blog originated; the idea that the most of the content that I post here is simply a regurgitation or other stuff that I find interesting on the web. I rarely post something original and that's how I like it.
I am well aware that not everyone knows what SXSW is and that there are a few out there following my Tweets who think I have moved to Austin, TX and lost my mind this week. That said, I still enjoy participating in the conference while I am here. The best way to do that is through hashtags, aggrigators, tweets, and re-tweets. All of those things are only relevant to the people who are HERE IN TEXAS. Most of the people at home don't care or are otherwise envious of my experience here ;) and to them I say: "shaddap, if you dont like it you can unfollow me and we will both be better off."
Until today.
Today, I read this post by @Waterproof: "Tweeting from SXSW – Don’t Throw Up On Me Please" which was then re-tweeted by @BrainTraffic. And of course, with a title like that, who can pass it up?
In this post, Stephen details exactly the experience that I mentioned above; people at conferences who tweet all their session notes, quotes, commentary, witty comments, GPS check-ins, pictures of lunch, drunken confessions, and twitpics to their Twitter stream. But, by doing so, accidently end up barfing all over their other followers (guilty as charged). I never intended for this to happen. I always just blamed it on the "emerging media trends" and "twitter growing pains" or "stupid Evan Williams". But no, Stephen proposes a better way:
Stephen proposes to create an alternate Twitter account DEDICATED to the barf. Well, since I already have a blog dedicated to the barf, why not a Twitter account to kick around too? So, beginning tomorrow (which is actually today since I drank too much caffeine at dinner) I will use @bhansbarf as my way of excusing the rest of you from my SXSW experience. He (@bhansbarf) will still be seen and heard from the hashtag followers at the conference and nobody will care about him when he leaves. If you are genuinely interested you can follow @bhansbarf for all (and I mean ALL) of the barf that he will post. If you get sick of him, send him a nasty message, slap him, and unfollow him.
He won't mind. Remember? That's his job.
I borrowed (read:stole) this picture from Stephen who got it from Jill
