It’s clear to me now. Blogs are for tweets that can’t fit into 140 chars. Often do I find myself with a nice idea that can fit into 140 chars, but that would also benefit to be exposed in greater terms on my blog. But the ease and quickness of posting to Twitter always wins.
The art of compressing a message to fit nicely into 140 chars is not given to anyone, though. My @slimCODE Twitter account (corporate) was followed by @RescoApps from Resco.net. Since I do use their Resco Explorer software, I politely followed back. Then I received these two automated direct messages:
Thank you for the follow!We hope our tweets will always remain worthful for you. Use our"new follower"gift.Will last only till 1st February.
The Gift:25%price discount on our PhotoManager for WM: http://www.resco.net/buy/pocketpc.asp?additem=11117&code=TWITTER1&m=Twitter Regards,R
Both messages are exactly 140 chars. Notice the absence of spaces after punctuation in the first message, and around the “25%” in the second message, and the use of “till” instead of “until” in the first message. And that second message with the ugly URL is unreadable. That’s lazy work, guys. You could have done much better! Understand the importance of good “Tweet Compression”. It’s an art!
For example, replace “1st February” with “Feb 1st” and you save 5 chars you can allocate to spaces and that missing “u” in “until”. Also, use smaller URLs. I understand the benefit of using your own domain. Add a redirection on your site, so you can use something like “www.resco.net/newfollower”, it’s much cleaner. Finally, drop that “Regards,R” signature. Twitter is not email.
Oh, by the way: “worthful” isn’t a word.
And also: I hate auto-direct messages. I’m not using Twitter to talk with robots. Unfollowed. :(