A Twitter Lexicon

On August 1, 2008, in social media, by Barbara Nixon

Twitter is my favorite microblogging service. There are many, many glossaries of Twitter vocabulary on the web. So many, in fact, it’s almost overwhelming to a newbie to Twitter.

Let’s come up with the top 10 words that someone new to Twitter should know. Here are eight that I came up with quickly. Can you help round out the list?

  1. Tweet: Your 140-character (or shorter) message
  2. Twittering: The act of sending your tweet
  3. Followers: People who receive your tweets
  4. Retweet: Forwarding a tweet to your followers
  5. @ : The symbol that precedes the name of a person you’re replying to
  6. Tweep: Someone you know on Twitter
  7. Tweeple: See “tweep”
  8. Twoops: Accidentally sending a direct (private) message publicly

(And if you’re wondering “what’s Twitter?” see the clear and concise description from Common Craft, the company that specializes in explaining complex things in plain English.)

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