Do Your Social Media Habits Change on Holiday?

Me & Ms 5 goofing around on holiday

Here in New Zealand, we are in the midst of our summer holiday season. A gloriously wet and rainy one (!!)  but still for most of us it's time away from the office and a chance to spend some time relaxing with friends and family.

So what happens to all that Twittering and Facebooking when you are with your Real Life chums?

Some people abandon their social networks entirely and then return after a period of deathly silence to upload 100 or so holiday snaps to their Facebook profile, only 5 of which anyone is ever going to scroll through (apart from your mum). On Twitter they pick up wherever they left off as if nothing has happened and secretly wonder if anyone missed them (which the answer is probably no. And you know it).

Of course, some of it depends on whether you have internet access wherever you are holidaying. I was amazed (shocked?) at how much mobile data I chewed through with only 3G access available to me. And one bar of 3G at that! But that's another story.

When I'm not on holiday I'd estimate I spend 70% of my social networking time on Twitter, 25% on Facebook and the last 5% scattered aimlessly around the other random networks that are left. But when on holiday, I found that I spent the biggest slice of my time on Facebook which is where the majority of my real life friends are. Since I was mainly sharing photos or tales of the holiday I was having with my own family, it made sense to do this on Facebook. On Twitter I don't share much of this as its probably quite boring to people I don't know and also for privacy reasons (but mainly the first reason if the truth be known. Sorry Mum). Also I don't like broadcasting to the whole world that I am away and then come home to a burglary. Telling my Facebook mates is not such a concern as most of them know me, so they are fully aware that there is nothing worth stealing my house anyway. True story.

This does imply that none of my mates on Twitter really know me - which is completely untrue. Plenty of people on Twitter know more about me than ... well.. me (probably). It also implies that I trust Facebook privacy settings which no-one in their right mind should do but as the same time if you don't want anyone to know stuff, then don't put it on the internet.

I have seen some talk lately about people abandoning Facebook after getting a shock at seeing their own new Facebook Timeline saying things like 'OMG Facebook knows too much about me!' Yes that is completely true - Faceboook knows all that stuff that you told them and has helpfully collated it together and put it (prettily) all in one place - and you are shocked by that? I mean - really? REALLY? If you don't want Facebook to know, then don't put it on Facebook. Simple as that really. I bet these are the same people who think nothing of sending to the NZ Herald photos of their kids running nude round the beach in the hope it will be printed on the back page.

So it is fair to say that being on holiday changes your habits in more ways than one, but when the holiday is over, normal transmission resumes.

<end of transmission>

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Are Your Twitter DMs Private? Or Not.

 

Photo: http://eclas.tumblr.com/ 

I've noticed lately that there are a number of Twitter DMs (Direct Messages) which should be private between two people, but have somehow found their way into the public timeline.

These tweets stand out a mile because they are not addressed to anyone and typically say something like "That's perfect, can't wait to see you... x" or "OMG OMG! She is such a b@#tch!" - you get the picture.

So how does this happen? Other than potentially being an issue with Twitter (which I am not aware of) its more likely to be user error, particularly when using SMS to tweet.

So.... here's a reminder that when you send an SMS to the Twitter shortcode, it will appear in your public timeline unless you use the correct commands. It's very easy to mess this up when you receive an SMS to notify you of a Twitter DM and you just SMS back to reply! Oopsie.

How to send a DM using SMS
D username + message

Direct Message: sends a person a private message that goes to their device, and saves in their web archive. 

Example: d Support Hey support! Thanks for your help

Also if you are using SMS to send Twitter DMs, and your message is longer than 140 characters, Twitter will split it into two messages, but the second part will be in the public stream as it is not prefixed with D username!

Other command examples for using Twitter via SMS are here. they're useful to know if you are ever somewhere with poor cellphone reception and can't get your app to work.

A few other tips:

You can only send a DM to some who is following you.  On #newtwitter this is easily signified by the appearance of the Message button on a users profile.

There is a Twitter limit of 250 DMs per day, and #newtwitter only shows the 50 most recent DMs.

If someone deletes a DM they have sent you, it will be removed from your DMs on Twitter. But if you have SMS alerting set up for DMs then you will still receive the SMS when the DM is sent. Clever huh?

Lastly, if you see someone's rogue DM pop up in your stream and they follow you, send them a quick message to let them know (especially if it is potentially embarrassing or damaging for them). Thanks to @rgoodchild for this tip!
  
  

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