Why I like Twitter so much

The weather in Nashville's been less than ideal over the past few weeks and it's reminded me how much I love and rely on Twitter. If not for Twitter, I wouldn't be as informed about traffic conditions, closures, and I wouldn't have learned that ice dams are a thing.

I've been an active Twitter user for eight years now, and I haven't gotten sick of it. Twitter is a lot more reliable than Facebook, especially now that Facebook will shove a post to the top of your timeline that's days (even weeks or months) old just because there was activity on it (like a new comment). People unknowingly share and re-share articles that are sometimes a few years old that they mistake for news, and I feel that that Facebook just isn't an environment for timely or factual information.

The people you follow on Twitter are the people you choose to follow and you're not forced to accept someone's friend request just because you know they'll be butthurt if you don't. Not saying it doesn't happen on Twitter but it's a lot easier to avoid the crazy there than on Facebook.

Now, if you're not as concerned with getting real-time news and you prefer fluff or US Magazine level news; if you enjoy peeking into the lives of people you haven't seen or talked to since you were 15 and if you just LOVE seeing other people's ultrasounds then Facebook is great for all that.

Hell, I won't deny that I enjoy scrolling through Facebook, sometimes it's nice to give my brain a break. Maybe it's schadenfreude. But I do my utmost not to divulge much about myself aside from the occasional soapbox - much easier to do when you don't have character limitations. But I've stopped posting pictures of myself and of my family and friends on there because I enjoy some level of privacy, and I am sure my friends/family do too.

Anyway, back to why Twitter's reliable. Here's a good example: If you've lived in Nashville for more than six years, you were around for when Twitter proved itself really useful - during the flood of 2010 when none of the news outlets reported anything because it was the weekend and they were, at the time, slow to catch on to social media. Every update I got came from the other Nashvillians I followed, and whether we intended to or not, Twitter became a source of support. If I'm not wrong, that's basically when news outlets finally became active on social media.

Speaking of, I recommend following @NashSevereWX if you live in Nashville or nearby because they are the best source of updates during bad weather. Now excuse me, I'm going to check my Twitter feed to see if I should be panicking and stocking up on milk and bread or not.