FollowFriday for the Godless

I created the "Atheists" FollowFriday page as a service to the growing community of outspoken atheists emerging on twitter. Many of them are Atheist bloggers who promote their blog on twitter.

Many like myself just like to share links to interesting atheist related blogs and news reports.

If you follow a variety of atheists as I do, you will soon discover that other than a non-belief in God, atheists don't consistently agree on much of anything else. So, the idea that atheists share a worldview is pure myth.

I don't really like the label "atheist" much. It just seems kind of meaningless to define oneself in terms of what one doesn't believe in. I could also call myself a non-pink-unicornist or a non-spaghetti-monsterist and it would have a near equivalent meaning, that is, if it weren't for all the theists who populate the world around me.

If you check out the FollowFriday page you will see a wide variety of my twitter siblings all of whom have varying degrees of interconnectedness. If you want to get an idea of how well you or another twellow is connected to a twibe of atheists check out Twitnest .

Is the Numbers Game Killing Twitter?

My activity is on Twitter centers on trying to build a network of like-minded people to share ideas with. Generally, I like to post links and comments about current news events that I think might be of interests to other atheists. I try to pick the stuff I think others might enjoy reading, watching or listening to. And I enjoy getting feedback comments, DMs and retweets from my followers.

I've been trying to find new followers who share my interests but I keep getting followed by spammers and scam artists. I recently found this advice online on how to identify accounts not to follow. I wish I had seen this earlier.

Quick tips to identifying Twitter spam:
- Woman’s name + some numbers, in the username.
- Follow ratio is way off, they follow lots, nobody follows them.
- “get rich quick” scheme, regarding followers.
- Look at their posts- all plugs for products

I think the numbers game is killing Twitter. I just wonder how many of my followers represent truly interested users? How many of my followers really care what I post on Twitter or ever click on the links I post? To find out I started using Cligs. Cligs is a URL shortening service that can give you some pretty cool information about the hits your posts get.

Out of the nearly 2000 followers I've got only a small fraction of them respond with a click. So the numbers don't really mean very much.

I've a TwitterGrader rank of 99.4 and they place me at about 17,000 out of nearly 3,000,000 Twitter users. Gradually, I've come to recognise that these numbers and rankings are nearly entirely meaningless. The personal feedback I get is really much more significant.

Most people using Twitter only monitor a small group of their followers by using features provided by Tweetdeck or other twitter clients. So, I think everyone knows the numbers don't mean very much.

I have begun to turn my attention to Friendfeed which I think is a good way to leverage Twitter.

Posting to Twitter from the Command Line using cURL

If you enjoy enjoy "hacking" Twitter's API as Zak and I do you probably already know how simple and easy it is to use it.

You can post your updates via your favorite scripting language. Zak likes Ruby but I prefer using AutoIt3.

You can post Twitter updates via Windows Cmd.exe and cURL.

curl --basic --user screen_name:password --data status=" $text_of_tweet " http://twitter.com/statuses/update.xml

Or from AutoIt with this line.

RunWait(@ComSpec & " /c " & 'curl --basic --user screen_name:password --data status="' & $text_of_tweet & '" http://twitter.com/statuses/update.xml', "", @SW_HIDE)

;$text_of_tweet = your update

Zak and I have written our own little twitter client programs to make tweeting easier.

Mine automatically saves all my postings to a file on my system for later reference and many other things to make life easier.

If you enjoy exploring how stuffs works, check out the Twitter API and cURL.

Have Fun,
Zip

The Open Source Model Applied to Political Action Using Twitter

The "0pen source model" used for software development is now being applied very effectively by political conservatives using the power of Twitter to connect people online. On their site they maintain a list of "Action Projects" members are welcome to join and participate in.

At TCOT (Top Consevatives on Twitter), the projects are led by PS-Ls (Project Servant-Leaders) . They chose the term "PS-Ls" very intentionally to reflect the stewardship nature of leadership in their group. There is a definite hierarchical structure to their group but the projects are open to people who wish to contribute to achieving the groups goals. They seem to disavow and disaprove of an autocratic leadership style. They want you to leave your ego at the door, so to speak, if you decide to get involved.

Their stated goal is to restore limited government, free markets, and conservative principles to the governance of the United States.

"Team members who devote the time and money to the accomplishment of the goals of the project, therefore, should be lead with recognition of their commitment. Servant-leadership is an inherently conservative principle. Just as a government with too much power inevitably leads to problems, a leader with too much power does the same. Government - or leaders - with too much power either take away freedom and initiative or poorly allocate resources.

As a grassroots volunteer organization facing a huge challenge, TopConservativesOnTwitter.org (TCOT) cannot afford either reduced initiative or poorly allocated resources. PS-Ls will, in contrast to autocratic leaders, ensure the group receives the most value and best results. PS-L's, in essence, recognize the power of the free market in political ideas and organization."

People get involved by finding a mentor and going through a kind of orientation. Then as talents and abilities are assessed and matched up with "Action Projects" members gain status and responsibility. I am very impressed with they way they apparently manage their organization and the speed with which they can respond to current events.

I think we will likely see more groups of individuals with shared values organizing themselves via Twitter to accomplish all kinds of shared purpose and goals.