Friday, October 08, 2010

Twitter

I have tried not be an old fogey in the face of new technology, and Isaac has helped in that, enormously. It’s not surprising: he used to work for Google, and now he works for Twitter.

He first got us onto email, which now I can’t live without. He moved us onto broadband, which makes our life on dial-up seem like an awful bygone age (I can still hear that dreadful dial-up tone in my head, the tone that so often led to nothing.) And he launched me on my blog. So far, however, Twitter has been the fence I can’t leap over.

I feel I am letting him down, especially when Twitter pays his wages, and keeps a roof over his and Wendy’s and Lux’s head. He says “Don’t worry. I know you’ll come to it eventually,” and I think “No, I won’t.” I have enough distractions in my life which interfere with my ability to think clearly, or to simply be quiet and get on with my writing, without introducing yet another one.

And anyway, what is the point in my tweeting when many of my friends don’t even check their email more than twice a week?

I have just read an interview with a successful writer who says that writing is a lonely business and she chats to her other writer friends on Twitter, as you would a work colleague sitting at the next desk. But neither of my writing friends whom I email regularly (and who do check their emails at least twice a day) are on Twitter, so that idea is down the chute.

So in view of this and my lack of enthusiasm for engaging with Twitter, I have to record that yesterday, for the very first time, I wished I could tweet, because I had a doozy. How cool is this for a tweet?

went to the hallamshire to fetch my new breast

Tune in tomorrow for the back story.

2 comments:

Diane said...

I really do think you should tweet. I might do a blog post about why at some point, but for starters: to reach and connect with your audience and other writers, not just people you already know. Does this help sell books? Yes, it can. It can at least make people more aware of who you are and convince publishers (who care so much about digital platforms these days) that you have a fanbase.
And, it's fun! I think you'd be great at it :)

Sue Hepworth said...

Thanks for the encouragement, Diane. Can you explain how people would find my tweets, and then be impressed and buy my books, if they didn't know me?