Are you on Twitter?
It’s not just a place where people argue or live-tweet television shows or political debates.
Yes, there are all kinds of annoying people there. But you don’t have to follow them.
I don’t.
I’ve decided that I want to be informed, but I can choose who to listen to and where to get my information.
So if you’re just starting out on Twitter or maybe trying to customize your feed a bit more, here’s some suggestions.
Local, regional, national, and international news outlets.
You don’t have to follow those news outlets you can’t stand. But it is nice to at least be informed of local and regional events and occurances.
For example, living in a more rural area, I follow the closest city’s news feed. I also follow the news feeds from two bigger cities within a couple hours of my home. There are newspapers, television stations, and radio stations.
In addition to news, I follow local and regional weather accounts. Not only do they provide forecasts, they often retweet some pretty awesome pictures of clouds and rainbows and storms.
In keeping with being informed about local and regional events, I’ve begun following the state patrol’s public information officers’ accounts. They have information about traffic issues. They also tweet about new patrols or new driving regulations.
Ok, so The Onion isn’t exactly a real news source, but they’re fun to read.
And last year, with all of the wildfires plaguing the West the past few summers, I begun following the local first responders’ accounts and the wildfire accounts. It’s so handy getting all this kid of information quickly.
While you’re building your Twitter account and deciding who to follow, ask yourself what your hobbies are and find people associated with those hobbies.
I love books, so I follow publishing houses and authors and book bloggers.
If you like history or theology or art or science or nature, there are so many people you can follow.
If you like historical figures, there are so many different people who have taken it upon themselves to tweet for those historical people. THere are also people who tweet as fictional characters.
If you are fond of animals, there are so many animal accounts out there. Some about animals, some where the animals do the tweeting.
I hope that you’ve seen something here that sparks your interest.
Any of theses accounts look interesting enough to make you want to get a Twitter account and start tweeting? Or just maybe just following them?