Deane called me out yesterday on my use of twitter. His post, entitled Kingdom of the Non Sequitur, railed against the frequency of the inside joke (on twitter).
Being new to twitter, Deane is still concerned with how best to use the service. When he looks back at each tweet, he’d like to be able to say, “yep, that’s a complete, cogent thought. It’s a mini blog post.” Here’s a great example of one such tweet:
This is definitely a mini blog post. And an interesting one at that. I had no idea there were enough of these in the world to establish an expectation for size.
But Twitter doesn’t ask for anything more than an answer to the question: What are you doing?
So, in this regard, learning about the non-magical characteristics of ligers and tigons really doesn’t give any clues as to what Deane is up to. Granted, Deane is tweeting as @gadgetopia, which also happens to be the name of his blog. And If I had to guess what Gadgetopia was up to at any given time, I’d say mini blog posts.
But I tweet as myself, and sometimes I’m just not very concerned with cogency. As in the tweet he points to as an example of an inside joke:
For what it’s worth, this just happened to be what I was thinking at the time. Actually, the full tweet was intended to go like this:
Has anyone seen @brianoberkirch’s dongle? Also, why does this remind me of the song Detachable Penis?
But I accidentally posted half the tweet when I bounced to Google to confirm the name of the band.
Back to the point. I use twitter to (1) post what I’m doing, (2) post what I’m thinking, (3) ask a question, or (4) respond to something somebody else is (4a) doing, (4b) thinking, or (4c) asking. My twitter account really doesn’t represent anything more profound.
So, even though I’m probably not always thoughtful enough to hold back an inside joke, this just happened to be what I was thinking at the time.
I hope this helps, Deane. Be sure to let me know in the comments if you found this:
(a) extremely helpful
(b) kind of helpful
(c) not really that helpful
I’m squarely in the middle and understand Deane’s plight.
I initially wondered the point of reading people’s inside jokes and lame personal details.
Then, I became hooked. Like all the cool kids.
Finally, I realized I was searching for reason on the Internet. That was my problem. Now, I just ride the wave and watch out for dongles.
CWV
P.S. - Everyone knows that it’s Kingmissle.
The thing about Liger-Tigon size is even more interesting than I had room for on Twitter.
When the mother is a lioness (in the case of a Tigon), the cat inherits “growth-inhibitory” genes. When the mother is a tigress (in the case of a Liger), the fetus is exposed to a hormone that programs it to grow much larger than normal.
There are documented cases of Ligers growing to 1,100 pounds.
Another cool fact: there are fewer Tigons in the world than Ligers, because male tigers have trouble figuring out that a lioness wants to mate. The inverse is not true, apparently — male lions are all over those female tigers.
I wonder if they use Sex Panther, by Odeon.
Crud, I need a scorecard now. DB posts that he doesn’t get your partial mind meme … in response you expend well over 140 characters both explaining and defending the fact that such a post requires no defense nor explanation?
Normal Deane - see, this is why people find you so interesting.
Mean Deane - that sounds about right.
Corey - hi.
And you guys wonder why you are up til 3 every night and back at it at 6? Blame it on twitter.