Tweet Ethics

Check out this blog post from Tweet Smarter about giving credit for tweets, and how to not get your account suspended from twitter.

You can find the whole post here: http://blog.tweetsmarter.com/retweeting/the-retweet-stylebook-a-short-collection-of-standards/

How Misunderstanding Retweets Can Get You Suspended From Twitter
by DAVE LARSON on MARCH 28, 2011

Retweet standards are about curator attribution. (When you’re looking at a tweet, the curator is the person who posted that tweet). Retweet standards build loosely on internet hyperlink standards, making them essentially two generations removed from old print standards (Print>Internet>Twitter). The most important thing to know is:

► Twitter reserves the right to suspend users for posting tweets without proper retweet attribution if done repeatedly. Here’s Twitter’s rule:

“Post[ing] other users’ Tweets as your own” is a suspension-worthy violation of the Twitter rules.

1. Who should get credit?

Everyone needs to get credit—the author, the site or publication, and the person who shared the information in a tweet. But the only thing you need to ADD to a tweet turn it into a retweet is the Twitter username of the curator. It’s perfectly okay to include the Twitter username of the content author or website in a tweet or retweet, it’s just not required. Here’s how and where everyone gets credit:

Author — Example: The byline on a blog post. This credits the author, so it’s not necessary to include author username in the tweet. Author attribution takes place at the content level, on the website.
Content (Site/Publication) — The link in the tweet takes care of this, paralleling the hyperlink attribution standard within websites. It’s not necessary to include the site’s username in the tweet because the site has been linked to.
Curator — Attribution takes place by the addition of retweet syntax, identifying the source curator’s Twitter username(s).
The first job of a retweet is to credit the person who made the tweet that led you to the content—the curator. The chain of attribution is Curator > Site > Author; this ensures all sources are credited.

2. How should users be credited in an editable retweet?

Retweet Glossary, Syntax and Punctuation is a good overview to familiarize yourself with.

Exact style here is not as important as maintaining the attribution chain leading to the original source. This means including all usernames when possible. The great thing about doing this is that you are making a connection with all those users by including their usernames. They will see your tweet because their username is in it.

This isn’t always easy, or even possible. The first step is to be as brief as possible, see “Tips and benefits of being brief when retweeting.”

Giving credit to multiple users

When you find a tweet that is already a retweet (that is, it credits one or more Twitter usernames), if you can edit the retweet into a new retweet that includes all curator usernames and still leave 19 characters of blank space, I suggest doing so. This how the retweet developed on Twitter. If you prefer to use a retweet function that does NOT allow editing, that’s okay too. But editable retweets also allow adding comments, besides bringing attention to the source curators, and are generally preferred by more experienced Twitter users.

Also, putting the usernames at the beginning of a reweet makes it hard to see the content portion of the tweet. I recommend for retweets with multiple usernames putting them at the end. For tweets with one username I think it’s also best at the end, but sometimes putting it at the beginning is a nice way to highlight the user.

3. How much can I modify a retweet?

If a tweet is edited to change its tone, viewpoint or meaning at all, it’s no longer a straight retweet. Don’t change tone or meaning of a tweet and then put it out as a plain vanilla retweet. Politicians are famous abusers of this, trying to make it look like their opposition said something they didn’t and then claiming they are “just retweeting what they said.”

If you want to retweet and add a comment, that’s fine. Putting the language of the original tweet in quotes helps. And using a different abbreviation (see #4 below) may be called for. There are also a number of services that allow you group collections of tweets into a single URL. This can be helpful if you need to comment on a conversation, or collection of tweets. Here’s one example: http://j.mp/LearnHashtags.

However the clearest option is often to link to the tweet itself (see section five below for how to). But starting with a regular, editable retweet and then carefully adding your own comment is often easiest.

4. What are some common errors?

► Thinking that the tweeter/retweeter is the blog post author

Don’t retweet someone and state that they are the author or thank them for a writing a post until you have confirmed who actually wrote it. Websites that don’t make the link to the site’s or author’s Twitter account very clearly visible are missing an opportunity, and creating a situation that can lead to confusion. I regularly see tweets thanking a retweeter for writing a post they didn’t write.

► Overlooking the community-building aspect of Twitter

Some feel that, regardless of Twitter’s rules, the content source or author are much more important than the curator. These people overlook the value of Twitter as an information network, and denigrate the role of curator, even going so far sometimes as to remove retweet credit and replace it with site or author credit.

Even if you don’t believe in crediting the curator (and aren’t concerned about having your account suspended), realize that you can curate connections as well as information on Twitter. Simply being generously inclusive with usernames in your tweets has the natural side effect that your tweets will be retweeted more because people will pay more attention to your tweets, and feel more generous towards you. The best part? Taking the simple steps to be inclusive with usernames begins to build a community.

The value of a Twitter community comes in many forms, but two dramatic examples are the $11,000 tweet and raising $13,000 in 48 hours for a friend (actually nearly $17,000 was raised). And as I write this, a Twitter user has just asked for “11 cents from 1,000 people for something stupid” and with no more description than that, has raised over $300 in just a few hours.

► Other errors

I’m going to add to this list, but I’d love to hear your thoughts and experiences! Leave a comment and I’ll add the best ones to this blog and link to you. (Knowing myself, I don’t want this post to sit aside for weeks until I can get back to it and fill out this section on common errors.)

5. When should I favorite a tweet instead of retweeting it?

You can use the tweet favorite function anyway that works for you. But you should know there is a large group of users on Twitter who “vote” for each other’s tweets by favoriting them. This informal group mostly relies on humor, and their goal is to get their tweets shown on the “leaderboard.” The leaderboard is a list of the latest, most favorited tweets at sites that keep track, such as Favstar.fm and Favotter.

However, Favstar is starting to incorporate other ways besides just “most favorites” of measuring which tweets should be highlighted each day. Nevertheless, realize that many writers of humorous tweets greatly appreciate having their tweets favorited by you

5 dead simple ways to spark up more conversations on Twitter

Here is a list of 5 ways to spark up more conversation on Twitter from http://www.socialglitz.com.
Check out the list below and the full article here: http://bit.ly/gRJ46h

1. Say more than “hi” to your new followers
This is a super simple technique I started to make part of my twitter routine. Whenever there is a new person following you on twitter, take a look at their profile. Check out their site for a glimpse of what they do and then welcome them with a reference to their bio.
It helped me answer the following simple questions about new followers before I directed my very first Tweet at them. What do they do? What do you think about what they do? How can you help them? How might he/she be able to help you? It adds more value than a simple “hi” and sparks up very interesting conversations.

2. Edit Retweets for more impact
Oftentimes we are tempted to do things the easy way. By only hitting the retweet button, you are missing out on the opportunity to add your personal note to the tweet. Try to edit each tweet you want to retweet by adding your thoughts.
I learnt that this has two major effects. First, your followers feel reassured that this is truly filtered news for them.
Secondly the person you are retweeting will notice that you gave some thought to his update, putting you on his/her radar and turning it into a great moment to follow up later or he might get back to you himself. It will only take you few seconds to do that, the return, however, is truly worth it.

3. Credit authors when you tweet their articles
If you are anything like me you will be reading many great posts every day. A super simple method to engage with the author of the post is to give them credit for their post if you tweet their article.
You can use this as an opportunity to make a quick comment about your thoughts. If you commented on the post itself, this can be your chance to really connect to the author, striking up a great conversation with them and increasing the amount of conversations you have on Twitter.

4. Tweet about the value of real life or Skype conversations
This is something I believe Twitter is really built for. By simply referring to a valuable conversation you just had, you add further value to your followers.
This is great, because not only will you share your findings from this conversation with your followers, but you will also build a tighter relationship with the person you just spoke to, giving them credit for how they helped or inspired you. Of course this technique depends on whether or not your conversation partner is a Twitter user too.

5. Give genuine #FF which create value
The last piece of advice I want to share is to make good use the #followfriday Twitter tradition. The biggest #followfriday faux pax you could possibly commit is to start a Tweet with #FF and then add as many Twitter users as possible to the Tweet. I strongly suggest not to do this, as the only thing you will be doing is cluttering your followers timeline.
Instead make #ff into something truly special. Give credit to one or at most 2 people, indicating clearly, why they should be followed. Not only will your followers appreciate learning about someone you care for, but the person you express your appreciation to, will become part of your ‘tighter’ network.