Work
SubscribeHacking Twitter's reply system
I'm only writing about this because I still see some tweets coming out of Twitter that are intended for everyone, but end up just going to a select few. This trick is pretty well used, but hopefully it'll help those people who haven't spotted it yet.
The way @replies work, is that if you start your tweet with @user only that user and your common followers (ie. that follow both you and me) will see the tweet.
If you want everyone to see the tweet, yet the tweet is in reply to @user, then you can you can hack the @reply system by putting a character before the tweet.
Instead of doing:
@brucel and I are doing are talking HTML5 at London Geeknights
I'll insert a period character (it can be anything you want) and it'll be seen by everyone:
.@brucel and I are doing are talking HTML5 at London Geeknights
When would you want to use this?
I only use this when my reply is of value to all my followers.
If it's not, and only a specific reply, then I don't hack the @reply.
Inverting the hack, not CC'ing lots of people
The inverse of this hack (perhaps...!) is when you're having a conversation with a specific group of followers. You don't need to /cc them all if you all follow each other. For example, if I'm replying to a tweet from @codepo8:
@brucel @adactio HTML5 has wings! (not a real tweet!)
I can reply with simply:
@codepo8 Like redbull or something else?
And since @brucel & @adactio follow @codepo8 I know they'll see the reply too in their main stream.
If I want to force it in to their replies, then I'll include them in the @reply if it's really worth getting to their attention.
You should follow me on Twitter here I'll tweet about JavaScript, HTML 5 and other such gems (amongst usual tweet-splurges)
Introducing HTML5%7Cutmcsr%3D(direct)%7Cutmcmd%3D(none)%3B%2B__utmv%3D51955687.-%3B)
Another thing to note is that if you @mention yourself in a tweet, it will show up for all of your followers.
For example, if I was to tweet “@rem Cheers from @mathias!” all my followers would see it, regardless of whether they follow @rem or not.
@Methias - ooo, are you sure? I didn't know about that, if so, that's very useful to know!
Thanks. It took a while to figure this out. I remember there used to be some settings that allowed you to view your friends replies in timeline, but later that was removed. I think, the current behavior is just fine.
It's a cool hack, but breaks something that was fixed. Filtering out @replies to people you don't follow has saved twitter from death by chatty twerps.
You could also just write:
Me and @brucel are talking HTML5 at London GeeknightsEveryone sees it, and there's no hacking.
@Paul - absolutely why it should only be used when appropriate. i.e. if my reply to someone is going to help other people understand or see something useful to them (based on a rough understanding of my own followers), then I'll use the technique.
@Michael - in that example, that's exactly what I'd write, but sometimes the sentence doesn't make sense rewritten.
I use this to my advantage a lot at conferences.
That way I don't spam all my followers with conf related info.
For those using the twitter Facebook app to cross post tweets as fb updates, the @myself reply is useful for messages that you want to go to all your twitter followers, but not get sucked into Facebook (the FB app filters out all @replies). It also makes for a barrage of "stop at-ing yourself" comments.