Favorites are like secret ballots. That has its place in society, but it doesn't serve the same needs as standing behind some alpha primate and banging your chest in time to stand behind his message. Favorites mark things for personal consumption. They are contemplative and reflective. It's done for self, so the secondary purpose as a popularity meter is in dissonance with the perceived primary purpose. Using favorites statistically *feels* like an invasion of privacy.
The new Retweet is expressive and *feels* like something that should be measured for public consumption. The use is fully in line with consensus building behaviors. Right now "me too" posts are universally lame across all social media as well as an unfortunate reality of human nature. They make some sense for Twitter because of the characteristics of the medium, but there are still some issues with that. The Twitter community deals with this by making retweets value added within the limits of the medium, whereas this functionality deals with the root causes of why the "me too" impulse is contrary to accepted standards of on-line behavior. The data structure is simple, so it will save storage. It exposes a common key value for all retweets of a message, so output *can* be filtered to save network and social bandwidth. It will be simple to execute and the user interface will be interpreted as implicit or explicit approval as needed by the users. It will also be measurable, so the "me too" response is restored to its proper role in democratic/primate behavior as a useful tool for consent building and group behaviors. Don't mistake me for an advocate; I'm dreading how this is going to play out in media where it is less suited. No, what you are seeing here is 100% grudging admiration. The savannah and "Down and Out in the Magic Kingdom" are one step closer together for all of this. Probably it did start out as an optimization, but this thing is going to be hot whether we like it or not. Chris On Mon, 17 Aug 2009 12:36:41 +0100 Paul Kinlan <paul.kin...@gmail.com> wrote: > Chris, > For sure the, that is what I see happening with the Retweet API, the > fact that there is no status text on > http://twitter.com/statuses/retweet/id.format indicates just that - > which is why I would like to see favourites API drastically enhanced > in tandem. > > Currently this Retweet API serves only as forwarding mechanism, which > is not how a lot of people use it. A lot of people either add > comments, to a retweet or like to have their face on the retweet (I > am retweeting this etc) so from a UX POV their is now a distinct > break in the twitter site, and the RT usage is now forced upon the > users (in my opinion curtailing the evolution of this emergent > behaviour) unless they simply type RT into a reply and add comment - > so now we have two forms of retweet neither quite right. > > Currently this Retweet API seems like a favoriting system, combined > with publishing but there is a favoriting system already in place > which needs some loving and can be used as "vote for" without the > publish. > > I wonder if some of this is an optimisation on Twitters end, so to > save duplicating identical tweet (from a retweet) the status text is > shared amongst all the receivers of retweet. > > Paul > > 2009/8/17 Chris Babcock <cbabc...@asciiking.com> > > > > > On Mon, 17 Aug 2009 02:43:50 -0700 (PDT) > > janole <s...@mobileways.de> wrote: > > > > > If you just don't agree with a tweet and want to express it via a > > > retweet, how can you do so with the proposed API? Seems to be > > > impossible or am I missing something? > > > > The new retweet API does not circumvent any of the current methods > > of expression. The only thing that it does is provide a method for > > verbatim retweets that is appropriate on social, semantic and data > > storage levels. It doesn't appear to be designed to handled "value > > added" retweets. There's no reason that it should be. That mode of > > expression is already served well enough by emergent behavior > > surrounding the current API. Value added re-expression is an > > evolving part of the Twitter experience. Codifying the current meme > > for that expression would be counter-productive. This API is not > > attempting to do that. It's only a provision for a meaningful, > > trackable, acceptable "me too" message. > > > > So to discuss a post with which a user disagrees, the retweet > > mechanism would *not* be used. That is a value added expression > > that would be best served by linking or replying, depending on the > > scope of the disagreement. > > > > Chris > > -- USAK now has more active games than any other judge of its kind. This quarter, USAK members contributed over $200. Thank you! Out of pocket cost for the judgekeeper was $95 for this period. Costs for second quarter 2009 are estimated at $262. Your donation is appreciated (opens in PayPal): http://tinyurl.com/USAK-Donate
