Inside The Complex Stomachs of Twitter Community : Pick Your Sub
Over the past decade, Twitter has become the go-to app for Millennials across the globe, where they find people of like and unlike minds to interact with. Twitter is a hub of hilarity, nihilism, feminism and just plain stupidity. For anyone on twitter, you either fall into one of these four categories:
- The Influencer
These kind of people have followers in the thousands and are often the ones starting the conversations/discussions on Twitter. Technically, half their followers are fake but technically, no one cares.
The Influencers bring you update (fake and real) and try as much as possible to solicit opinions on the happenings around the world. One major characteristic that sets them apart is their innate desire to want to start a trend. They often are the one starting cheesy polls like:
“If you were to choose between a date with Rihanna and taking $2000, which would you pick?”
Notwithstanding, a couple of these influencers are genuinely funny folks. However, a characteristic of the unfunny ones would be their short-fused temper. In a flick of the fingers, they can go from motivational to savagery; from preachy to slutty; from benevolent to brazenly pompous, going as far as listing their properties (i.e. MacBook, iPhone and all) in your face in a bid to job-shame the average Joe who dared to question them.
Howbeit, The Influencers are often a breath of fresh air on any timeline they grace. One reason for this is that most of their out-and-out outbursts are almost always amongst themselves. They call each other out for being fake: one Influencer, threatening to reveal the fakeness of another just to validate his/her own fakeness, all in a bid to get more traffic to push towards their next gig. It is almost always a business venture with these guys and most times, even without their intending it, they dictate the trends of the day. Publicity na publicity and what better way to get it that proliferation.
But do not get it twisted or think them weak at the center. The Influencer Community are strongest when they come together to face a common enemy. They are unforgiving in their banters and are capable of toppling institutions of repute in the span of hours.
Sadly, most of them tend to be hypocritical as well; because in the span of a few more hours, it won’t be a surprise to see them push publicity for the products/services of the same institutions they may have previously toppled in unison. And often, there would be one amongst them to call out the others on this hypocrisy and just like that, another battle ensues to the viewing pleasure of their heavily influenced audience. But like I said, it is almost always a business venture for these guys; nothing personal.
2. The Blue-tick gang
Often you don’t need to find these folks; they find you somehow. However, if you did not already follow them out-and-out on your entrance into the community, then you may come across a tweet from them that has been retweeted and just for the sake of intrigue and curiosity, you are likely to click on the “follow” button and become their follower. Your celebrities, politicians, media personalities, etc. are housed in this community
Like I said, most follow these folks out of curiosity and intrigue than for anything else. No one every truly follows the Gang for the love of who they are rather for the idea of who they are. They on the other hand almost never follow their lowly audience back. It is almost like a code in their circle: do not follow anyone without the blue-tick unless it’s Monday or Wednesday and one random fellow, who looks influential tags you as his/her Man or Woman Crush.
Also, while a lot of them are intellectual and very much accomplished, their opinion of the world is as myopic as the people within their circle. They are the gods of the community, looking down on their creations of curiosity and intrigue. They tend to have a close-knit circle with which they interact that include, fellow Blue-tickers, friends, family and that one cute guy or girl that somewhere along the line could make them look like they are in touch with the average tweeting Joe.
One key difference between the “Blue-tick gang” and “The Influencers” is that almost always, the latter tries to build their reputation on interacting with the average twitting Joe; as opposed to the former, who are often more inclined to interact with their brothers and sisters in the Blue-tick hierarchy. But, occasionally, they’d come down from their lofty thrones and like the iconic picturesque painting by Michelangelo of the Creation of Adam, they touch base, albeit a finger-tip graze, with the average tweeting Janet (yes, “Janet” I just recalled that most of them are self-proclaimed feminists or more so anti-patriarchy).
So, at such rare times when the gods decide to come to earth, it is almost like a prayer answered for one lucky tweeting Janet, who had haphazardly asked for assistance. Just like that her prayers would be answered by one Blue-tick god, who either offers to buy them an X-box or pay their rent or just plain distribute cash, benevolently to a couple of folks. But this benevolence often comes at a price for the recipient as the gods put a hurdle in place by asking for several retweets before what Janet seeks is handed to her. Basically, The Influencers disseminate the news, but the Blue tick gangs are the news.
Quick question: Do you consider The Influencers as the more savage in clap-backs? Well, if you do then you haven’t been on the wrong side of the Blue-tick gang, have you? Folks in the Blue-tick gang have just one defining move when it comes to clap-backs and it reads:
“I’m Rich, you’re not; fuck you!”
3. The Wannabees
This group of users are the easiest to spot. And I know because I am part of this group. A few hundreds or thousands of followers here and there and suddenly, they think they deserve plaudits for being funny or at least, deserve to be thought as funny by others. These group of folks also include the wannabe pundits, wannabe Influencers, aspiring writers, aspiring motivational speakers, educated prostitutes and Blue-tick gang laborers.
One way to spot folks in these community is that they know each other very well and thus show solidarity to their members. Hence, even when a tweet does not make any sense to them, they are more likely to retweet it if it is from a fellow brother/sister in their community. Truth be told, it hurts them to see their brothers/sisters tweet something and only get one like (often from themselves) or just one retweet. They are the true activist fighting an unjust tweeting hierarchy. So, they ensure that no matter what, when a member of their community tweets, they click on the Retweet button to show solidarity.
Another characteristics is that they almost always have an opinion on everything. Take nothing away from them though, 99% of them are far more intelligent than the Influencers and Blue-tick gang combined. But their biggest flaw is their continual push for relevance from the very Influencers and Blue tick gang community that often neglects them. It is almost as though they don’t trust themselves well enough to be convinced that they are who they say they are; and so, they are likely to seek validation from those higher, either via a Retweet or mentions.
Most of the traders and commerce in-towners also belong under this heading.
They are also the types who would tweet a joke and add the laughter emoji more than three times because only they find it funny, unfortunately. They are the types, as well, to criticize the government with salient points but still mention a dumb Influencer at the end of it; as though seeking his/her approval for their own thought process (they often don’t get it).
They are those who get a reply like: “Lol” from a member of the Blue-tick gang to their tweet and Retweet it, thinking their moment of fame is upon them.
They are the types who never seem to understand the idea of a pinned tweet, as they confuse it to mean the one tweet they got the most reaction to. Thus, you might see on their profile a pinned tweet of 50 retweets from June 2009 although the year 2018 is currently rolling to a close.
They are the community dreamer: spreading amazing ideas on their Timelines that often appears to get no reaction. Well, until they discover an Influencer plagiarizing these ideas to his/her own gain but are often won't of cowering in defeat at the thought of confronting the blatant thievery.
They are the ones with the most interesting threads that no one ever gets to or seldom reads. They are the DM experts: striking up beautiful conversations but somehow never able to take things further because of an innate sense of underachievement.
Even worse, they rarely get the follow back from the slay queens and trending babes with 5k+ followers, so they play scout; searching for the hottest on the come up - beautiful but with 3 figure followers, complete with a flaming avi and a bio that determines sound intellect or otherwise - with hopes of getting pussy.
Girls under this also imitate the scout tendencies, with the only difference being the likely passionate e-feminist fire after selling a bunch of canolis to unappreciative Influencers or Blue-tickers as Newcomers. They carry on till they find bae.
The Influencers disseminate the news, the Blue-tick Gang are the news, The Wannabees birth the news.
4. The Newcomers
They can be spotted, easily, by how quick they are to be “wowed” by the grandiose lecherousness, unhinged lasciviousness, untamed stupidity, and the grandeur fuckery that is not given in the general community. They are the target audience of The Wannabees; as the latter see themselves as superior in twitter experience. Sadly, while The Wannabees ought to have them on lock to help boost their audience base, they find that The Newcomers are often swayed by the seductive allure of The Influencers and the Blue-tick gang; which technically, isn’t really any fault of theirs.
Imagine coming from the “F” community where you had your extended family covertly supervising your every move and then landing in the “T” community where you can change your identity completely and cuss out whoever you want to cuss you or just act plain stupid and elated without any scrutiny.
In fact, they discover that in this community, if you act stupidly enough, you might be rewarded with fans. As such, The Wannabees often lose out on ascending the steps of community greatness by climbing on the backs of the Newcomers because the latter, too busy gazing at the stars will not bend their backs at all.
Overtime though, they become Wannabees themselves. They discover that the taste of freedom is often more caging than slavery itself. Soon enough, they realize that as enthralling as joining this almost-bohemian community is, it does not directly influence the reality of real life. They go online and get validations for their thoughts, whether stupid or intelligible by way of retweets and likes but come out to real life and are confronted with their insecurities of which none can be truly hidden.
Most girls under this cap believe in the Twitter Dream of nabbing the hottest guy on the fly. They comment and LOL all kinds of disturbingly ominous tweets about Ankaras or even burnt extension boxes, hoping to get noticed by The Influencers. They don't learn until they sell canolis to at least 3 influencers and tweet Men are scum at least 250 times. It's what I can the refinery stage.
And oh, what could forget the bigoteering from becoming an e-feminist and only to forget that when Mr. Right finally comes along. This however happens upon graduation to a Wannabe.
With time, the excitement to explore the community to its ends fizzles away and they decide to stick to those with whom they seem to share a semblance of frustration, whilst still looking towards the future with the hope that maybe one day (someday) they’d crawl out of their confinement and ascend the steps of Community greatness.
And it is a fleeting hope that they hold on to tightly. So tight that they keep tweeting: dry jokes, bland statements, uncalled savagery, etc.; consoling themselves with the belief that soon enough, with just one tweet, their status in this community could change significantly. In their heads, they reckon:
If the “4K” and “Keep the Change Bae” could do it, I can too.
By Mifa for Urban Central follow him on Twitter @Mifaunuagbo_
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