If you were using Twitter yesterday afternoon, you probably noticed that your following/followers count reset itself to “0″. As Scott Stratten described it, “And like that *poof* my false sense of popularity has vanished”.
Did you panic? I know that my heart skipped at least a beat before I realized that thousands of other people, many with much more extensive Twitter lists, were experiencing the same problem. I know the people I communicate with on a regular basis, but my Twitter list has evolved and grown so much during the past year and a half. The thought of starting over was daunting!
Thankfully, the official @Twitter account eased our worried minds:
Follow count display is set to 0 and follow/unfollow is temporarily offline while we fix a bug.
So, what happened exactly? Well, you can read about it at Mashable. Basically, Twitter was experiencing a bug that allowed any Twitter user to force another user to follow back. For example, if you really wanted Justin Bieber (”so i woke up here in LA and Twitter has been hacked. Turns out I am no longer popular”) to follow you back, you could have done it without his permission!
Come on, really?
I don’t quite understand the point of having someone forcefully follow you back. Do you really want the bragging rights that badly? Do you want to be able to say that Conan O’Brien is following you even though he really isn’t? I don’t mean to judge, but you’re obviously starving for attention.
Obviously, if a person hasn’t chosen to follow you, that person is not going to pay attention to what you have to say, even if you do show up in a Twitter feed. I have a tough enough time paying attention to the 700+ people I CHOOSE to follow, and I probably wouldn’t notice if someone force-added themselves to my mess of a feed.
It’s like having a crush on someone and forcing them to like you back. You can tie them to a chair and torture them until they say, “Fine, I like you”, but that doesn’t mean they actually like you.
Why would you want someone who doesn’t like you to follow you anyway? As my favorite saying goes, “The thing you want wants you back.”
Anyway, if you’re genuinely concerned about losing the relationships you have taken time to create and cultivate on the Interweb, you do have some options for backing up your hard work. Check out these services for peace of mind:
Tweetake: Allows you to back-up your followers, people you are following, and Tweets with just one click.
FriendBackup: A programmatic backup of Twitter friends.
Don’t think I haven’t fantasized about returning to pre-Twitter times, but sometimes I can’t even imagine a life with “0″.
(Photo by jason.lengstorf)