Two More Twitter Courtesies That Tweeple Appreciate

For a great primer on Twitter etiquette, read the Top 10 Rules at Brian Swichkow’s blog. I’d like to add the 11th and 12th rules, both of which have to do with giving credit where credit is due.

11. If You Didn’t Think of It First, Retweet. Case in point: Last week, I retweeted a great post on “Rage” via @Apocalypzia, which contained the famous “mad as hell” rant from the movie Network. The next day, a gal who follows me created her own url and tweet that pointed to the same video. Maybe it was Twitter Coincidence -- after all, that piece of footage with Howard Beale is famous -- but, if not, @Apocalypzia deserved a mention.

12. Don’t Use Somebody Else’s Words and Tweet Them As Your Own. One person I used to follow appears to write brilliant tweets, until you realize that she uses the title of the article she's linking to, plus however many words from the first paragraph will fit in 140 characters -- and that’s her tweet. The original sources -- most of whom are the well known bloggers who actually wrote the brilliant words -- deserve credit in her tweets. The rest of us deserve full disclosure so we don't waste time going to a site we've probably already visited.

-- scrubbed by Marketing Brillo