On July 28, 2010, Ivy Bean, who at 104 was considered the world’s oldest Twitter user, died peacefully in her sleep.

At the time of her death Bean had some 60,000 followers, and for the previous fortnight updates on her condition had been made by friends and family. When she died, it was announced quickly on Twitter and further statements regarding Ivy’s funeral and donations were made for the following week or so.

Ivy’s death received coverage around the world, and while labelling her as a celebrity might be stretching it a little, she was certainly much-loved and a figure very much in the public eye. She had a fan base, and those members were kept informed of her passing.

If you’re famous, chances are your death will be reported on Twitter, whether you’re a member of the network or not. But what about everybody else?

What happens when you die? Is there somebody you can rely upon to let everybody in your social network know what has happened? Would they know what to do if it happened now? Do they have your logins and passwords? Would they know what to say, and who (and where) to say it to?

And how quickly does it need to be said? Serious question: what’s the correct etiquette here? How many updates does the average person’s death need? Should the accounts of the dead ultimately be deleted – Twitter’s own policy says they have the right to do this with inactive users after a certain period of time – or should they be left alone as a kind of digital headstone?

Ultimately Twitter will likely need fresh policy here, but we’ve all seen how badly Facebook handles this kind of stuff.

(Incidentally, if you ever needed another reason to remove any kind of auto-tweeting connections on your Twitter profile, your eventual demise is as good as any. How bad is that going to look?)

As the line between off and online life continues to blur, the same preparations and guidelines we leave in the event of our passing need to be applied to the virtual world, too. It can’t be too long until this becomes a normal addition to any will.

This is perhaps a subject that nobody likes to think about, but it’s a reality, and one that can force itself upon us at any moment. Like you, I plan to live forever, but just in case the worst happens, what preparations can you take to ensure that the people who care about you don’t just think you disappeared?

(And if you think this is ridiculous and your followers wouldn’t care, then you need to find different followers.)

UPDATE: Twitter has some official policy on this, and even offers a facility to backup a deceased love one’s tweets. God only knows how long you can expect to wait for a response, however.

It’s a reasonable question. And if you can’t respond in any kind of meaningful way, then there’s only one reasonable conclusion.

Good answers:

• You’re interesting
• You’re fun
• I value your opinion
• You’re a friend
• I’m learning from you

Bad:

• You followed me first
• You might unfollow me if I don’t
• Somebody else told me to
• Who are you…?

Ugly:

• I don’t know

Set aside some time to browse through the list of people you are following, one at a time. Ask why. If you can’t find a genuine reason why you’re connected to another person, hit the unfollow button. Don’t delay. Just do it.

Make it a habit. Keep your network optimised. Trust me on this: your followers – the ones that actually matter – will thank you for it.

This may not be a very new development, but it’s new to me.

Last year I wrote quite a popular article informing users how to work out if somebody has blocked them on Twitter. Well, that information is now a little dated, as Twitter has provided us with a much easier way to tell if you’ve been blocked – just click on the follow button.

That’s all it takes. If you’ve been blocked by that user, Twitter will tell you. I tried it on @stephenfry, and here’s a screenshot of the message I received.

There it is in black and white – this user has blocked you from following them.

Nice and simple, definitely. However, this will inevitably lead to more spats on the network, as people take offense to being blocked by their idols and peers. Sometimes, for no apparent reason.

(Hat-tip to Peter for the spot.)

Please excuse the rant. It is offered with the best of intentions.

1. You Use TrueTwit

TrueTwit is a ‘validation service’ that sends out an automated direct message anytime somebody follows you, asking them to ‘verify’ their account. Here’s your wake-up call – nobody credible on Twitter uses TrueTwit. The funny part is that it’s almost always the people you want to avoid who use this tool – spammy marketers and affiliate-scheme pushers. What’s funnier still is they use the service to try and avoid other people like them.

And the part that will make you laugh-out-loud is most people will automatically unfollow somebody who asks them to verify their account.

2. You Auto-Follow

And you wonder why you get bombarded with direct message spam and seem to pick up every XSS exploit and hack that impacts the network. And have to resort to junk products like TrueTwit. If you didn’t auto-follow people back, none of this stuff would be an issue, would it?

Take a moment to check somebody out and make sure they’re relevant to your interests and goals before clicking on the follow button. And if you’re auto-following to churn followers, ask yourself why you have to resort to doing this instead of being useful or interesting.

3. You’re Following Tens Of Thousands Of People

This is totally unnecessary. Everybody on Twitter is connected. Follow the right people, ensuring your network is always relevant and optimised, and you should never have to follow more than a couple of thousand, because their networks then become your networks (by proxy).

If the people you follow aren’t giving you the information you require, swap them for somebody else. Don’t just keep adding more and more profiles until your feed becomes an unmanageable mess.

And if you’re using software to break this all up into columns, that’s fine, but ask yourself why you don’t just unfollow everybody who isn’t good enough to make one of your lists? If they’re not worthy of closer attention, why follow them at all?

4. You Retweet Yourself

As well as every little bit of positive press you get. Please stop.

5. You React Without Research

It’s great that you like to engage, but it would be better still if you took a moment to research your response before shooting off an immediate reply. If you’re responding to somebody’s opinion or a query they have made, do you actually know what they are talking about, or are you jumping to conclusions?

Has their question already been answered? Did they ask it a couple of days ago and have long-since moved on and have absolutely no idea what you are talking about?

Are you asking questions that could be solved in less than 30 seconds by heading over to Google or Wikipedia? Are you criticising others for doing the work that you can’t (or won’t) do yourself?

(And please – don’t shoot the messenger.)

Bonuses:

• Six months on, and you still don’t have an avatar
• You don’t leave enough space for me to retweet you (amazing how many high-profile accounts still do this)
• You’re a jerk
• You’re still living in fear
• You’re still trying to keep everybody happy
• You’re always looking for shortcuts
• You’re tweeting by committee
• You take everything personally
• You’re using (or promoting) a Twitter marketing scam
• You’re still using TinyURL to shorten your links

My word is not law (far from it). But there are patterns of behaviour on Twitter that continue to persist even when they blatantly fly right against the face of analytical research, social etiquette and good, old-fashioned common sense and decency. If you recognise yourself in any of the above, or find yourself doing these things, please take a moment to ask why.

And if you can’t find an acceptable answer, make the effort to change. Don’t put it off. Don’t try and justify your bad decisions. Move forward, and move upwards, and do it today.

For the most part, Twitter is a friendly place. There’s something about the connecting process between two strangers on a social network that encourages both of them to act in a polite and civil manner.

(As an aside, this can often contrast quite sharply with how our so-called real friends behave.)

However, from time-to-time, often regardless of how well you conduct yourself, things are going to get ugly. Indeed, it’s fair to say that the better you get at doing it right, the more likely it is that you’ll start to develop a sub-following of critics and haters, all of whom will gladly go out of their way to tell you that you’re actually doing it wrong. At least, in their opinion.

For you, this is actually a positive. It means you matter. As Colin Powell once said:

“Good leadership involves responsibility to the welfare of the group, which means that some people will get angry at your actions and decisions. It’s inevitable if you’re honourable. Trying to get everyone to like you is a sign of mediocrity. You’ll avoid the tough decisions, you’ll avoid confronting the people who need to be confronted, and you’ll avoid offering differential rewards based on differential performance because some people might get upset.”

While it’s often true that haters are actually some of your biggest fans in disguise, a growing number of them will be unpleasant, often seemingly bitter people, arguing endlessly and clearly for the sake of it. It’s a trap, and no matter how hard you try, sometimes you’re going to get caught.

It’s these folks I want to address in this article, and in doing so I’d like to pay homage to the words of the great philosopher James Dalton, whose guidance seems very appropriate here.

When push comes to shove, you’ll need to ask yourself – what would Dalton do?

All you have to do is follow three simple rules. Read the rest of this entry