I see a few students starting to venture into the Twitterverse, so I thought I'd pass on a few tips for developing a good informational network, and for protecting your privacy.
- Don't make your last name public. As an adult, I do list my last name publicly, but students should not disclose this information.
- Don't list your specific location. You don't know exactly who is out there, so keep your location private.
- Use an icon, or non-identifying image as your avatar.
- Make your tweets private. There is a setting to make this possible. Go to your profile and click on ''settings,'' then scroll down and check the box that says ''Protect my tweets.'' This allows you to control who sees your tweets.
- Choose who to follow carefully. Twitter is a great way to get news and can provide a really powerful network for learning if you follow the right people, but you also need to be aware that there are spammers and people with unknown intentions out there.
- Keep track of who is following you. You can block spammers and people you don't want from your followers list.
- Be careful of direct messages, and don't respond to people you don't know. If someone contacts you asking for personal information, don't give it to them, and tell an adult.
- Never sign up for a Twitter account, or any other social media account without telling your parents or guardians.
- Protect your online image. Twitter is a very public place, and anything you say could be passed on to others. The internet is like a permanent bulletin board! What you post out there, stays out there.
Once you have an account, one of the first things you should do is learn about hashtags. They can help you follow topics and discussions. You can find a directory of hashtags here.
Here are some other things that might help you out:
Don't forget to follow the library's twitter account: @hgilibrary
Here are some other things that might help you out:
- Twitterfall is a place where you can use keywords to find posts on a topic of interest. Watch the results ''pour in.''
- Twtpoll lets you create polls that you can send out on twitter.
- Paper.li allows you to make a daily newspaper from your twitter feed, or the twitter feed of people you specify.
Don't forget to follow the library's twitter account: @hgilibrary