So you log in and you see: “I tweeted this RT from @aplusk and my followers freaked out. I even got DM and it was almost a TT! #Lamepeopleirritateme”. Melted brain? Don’t worry, it’s not as strange as it sounds.
Starting with RT. Some time ago Tony Hawk posted “RT @someone It’s my birthday!” Of course, people wished him a happy birthday. Little did they know, RT stands for ReTweet. This means that the person is forwarding someone else’s post to spread the word. Retweeting is done a lot and is a quick way to get the word out about anything or anyone. It’s like the old pyramid schemes, if one sells for ten and each sells for ten and so on.
Then the @ signs. This is just a way to mark that you are using someone’s unique Twitter name. @aplusk turns out to be Ashton Kutcher. (A plus K do you get it?) So whenever you see an @ sign, just realize that it refers to someone. When you use the person’s unique Twitter name via @, that post also appears on a separate page on her profile that you can choose to see often to see who’s talking about her.
DM means direct message. It’s a bit like an email sent via Twitter with a 140 character limit. You can only send these private messages to someone who is following you. This makes it easier for you to delete an inbox full of spam or unwanted messages.
The last thing the above message talks about is TT, Trending Topics. On the side of your profile page (or in your menu if you are using a phone app) you will see a list of topics. These change frequently and generally refer to what’s hot in the news or entertainment industry. It’s a way of looking at what “everyone is talking about”, as it takes thousands of tweets to start a TT. One way to alert people that you are trying to start a TT is to use a hashtag that is represented by the pound sign ‘#’. Example: If @pink posts a new album, he could tweet something like “My new album just released !! Buy #greatesthitssofar online or at your local store!” This shows that you would like your album name to be ‘trending’ giving it optimal recognition.
