Monday
Apr202009
Okay Twitter, lets do this!
Monday, April 20, 2009 at 10:08PM
I was talking to a friend recently about being single in New York City. I half joked that it was easy because I have Twitter to talk to at the end of the day. Obviously, that is not preferable but sadly Twitter has become the relationship that I use to communicate the minutiae of my life. That sounds tragic, I know. What can you do?
Lately this Twitter boyfriend of mine has started to feel very high-maintenance. Not all the time, but regularly. I would say that I get some kind of unsolicited nastiness over Twitter at least once a day and it seems to be linear: the more people that join Twitter, the more hurtful @ comments come my way. I have a few points-in-case below.
I know this post may sound like a petulant pigtailed school girl crying because the boys are pulling her hair. But in a way, isn't that what is happening? It isn't that I can't take it, but I certainly don't have to like it. So since this is my personal forum, I'm going to vent.
Ever since I took over for Molly Wood on Buzz Out Loud I have felt like a veritable bullseye for nastiness. I haven't seen this kind of unsolicited mean spiritedness since I wrote for TechCrunch in 2006. I gave an example on Buzz Out Loud, episode 942. I could copy and paste examples like this all night. Admittedly, most of the emails and Twitters I receive are positive, encouraging, humorous, and fun interactions about my work and technology news. I appreciate those so much! It is the unrelenting two percent that sling mud with whom I have had it up to here with! (I just raised my hand WAY above my 5' 2.5" body!)
The basic point of this post is this: BACK OFF! If you don't appreciate my Twitters or any of my broadcasts, don't follow, read, listen or watch! Go away and you and I will never have to exchange digital words again. But don't throw stones from the safety of your browser.
Feel free to stop reading now if you're tired of this rant. My point has mostly been made. But here is some background, in case you are interested.
Before Christmas, I got a call from my BOL cohost Tom Merritt. He said that Molly wanted to move on and do other things and give up BOL in the New Year.
Natali: "Sure I'll help out a few more days a week."
Tom: "No, actually I meant, would you consider cohosting permanently?"
Natali thinks: HECK NO!
Natali says: "Oh, wow, that is a nice offer. I'll think about it."
I wanted to decline BOL for all the obvious reasons: 1. I already work long enough hours; 2. BOL's audience is vast, loyal, and particular; 3. Molly and Veronica Belmont were great hosts and I didn't want to be compared to them for the sole fact that we all have two X chromosomes. I confided in a friend about this and he said, "Say yes before you say no." I now question whether or not that person was ever really my friend but I took his advice and said yes. And I am still saying yes. And I am waiting for the day when I can enjoy myself on the show and know that if I say something stupid like Tom, Molly, and Jason Howell regularly do, I will not get a nasty email or Twitter attributing my foible to my looks, gender, age, race, or something else unfair and ignorant.
I am not writing this post so that the people who do follow and support me can ring in and sing my praises. I don't need that. In fact, I have closed the comments on this post for that very reason. I don't want this to seem like a solicitation for compliments and support. I am writing so that anyone who wants to be ugly knows that they are being ugly to someone who is doing the very best she can and then just maybe they can have a little empathy.
I don't come home at night and cry on someone's shoulder. I work long hours. I live on the opposite side of the country from my family. No one pats me on the head and says, "It's okay, they're just out to get you." At the end of the day, I take these bullets alone and resolve to keep giving this career of mine 110%. I'm not saying I'm brave - a lot of women go it alone for much more noble causes. I'm just saying that I cannot do any better than the job I do now. I go to sleep at night exhausted knowing that I gave it all I had. If that isn't enough, please kindly remove me from your peripheral Web vision.
I know its easy to ask the naysayers to go away and that they probably won't. I know that as my career grows, I will deal with this more and more. I also know that the people whom I am referring to are what my friends and I call a Lame Barnacle: someone so committed to their own misery that their lameness is calcified. Not only are they indefinitely lame, they stick to you like a barnacle and are hard to pry off. I believe the Lame Barnacle imagery is so powerful that I even bought the URL lamebarnacle.com. I don't know if I'll ever do anything with it but the women in my life find the moniker highly relatable. But I digress.
In conclusion, Twitter Lame Barnacles, I know I should ignore you. After all, as one viewer wrote me today, "for every douche, there are 20 non-douches." In real life, my track record for distinguishing the douches from the non-douches is bad. That's why I don't date. But on Twitter, the douches have their peacock feathers clearly fanned. I know who you are. I do not appreciate you. I would love an invitation to sit and have tea in your glass house someday. Meanwhile, stop pulling my hair!
[gallery link="file" columns="4"]
Lately this Twitter boyfriend of mine has started to feel very high-maintenance. Not all the time, but regularly. I would say that I get some kind of unsolicited nastiness over Twitter at least once a day and it seems to be linear: the more people that join Twitter, the more hurtful @ comments come my way. I have a few points-in-case below.
I know this post may sound like a petulant pigtailed school girl crying because the boys are pulling her hair. But in a way, isn't that what is happening? It isn't that I can't take it, but I certainly don't have to like it. So since this is my personal forum, I'm going to vent.
Ever since I took over for Molly Wood on Buzz Out Loud I have felt like a veritable bullseye for nastiness. I haven't seen this kind of unsolicited mean spiritedness since I wrote for TechCrunch in 2006. I gave an example on Buzz Out Loud, episode 942. I could copy and paste examples like this all night. Admittedly, most of the emails and Twitters I receive are positive, encouraging, humorous, and fun interactions about my work and technology news. I appreciate those so much! It is the unrelenting two percent that sling mud with whom I have had it up to here with! (I just raised my hand WAY above my 5' 2.5" body!)
The basic point of this post is this: BACK OFF! If you don't appreciate my Twitters or any of my broadcasts, don't follow, read, listen or watch! Go away and you and I will never have to exchange digital words again. But don't throw stones from the safety of your browser.
Feel free to stop reading now if you're tired of this rant. My point has mostly been made. But here is some background, in case you are interested.
Before Christmas, I got a call from my BOL cohost Tom Merritt. He said that Molly wanted to move on and do other things and give up BOL in the New Year.
Natali: "Sure I'll help out a few more days a week."
Tom: "No, actually I meant, would you consider cohosting permanently?"
Natali thinks: HECK NO!
Natali says: "Oh, wow, that is a nice offer. I'll think about it."
I wanted to decline BOL for all the obvious reasons: 1. I already work long enough hours; 2. BOL's audience is vast, loyal, and particular; 3. Molly and Veronica Belmont were great hosts and I didn't want to be compared to them for the sole fact that we all have two X chromosomes. I confided in a friend about this and he said, "Say yes before you say no." I now question whether or not that person was ever really my friend but I took his advice and said yes. And I am still saying yes. And I am waiting for the day when I can enjoy myself on the show and know that if I say something stupid like Tom, Molly, and Jason Howell regularly do, I will not get a nasty email or Twitter attributing my foible to my looks, gender, age, race, or something else unfair and ignorant.
I am not writing this post so that the people who do follow and support me can ring in and sing my praises. I don't need that. In fact, I have closed the comments on this post for that very reason. I don't want this to seem like a solicitation for compliments and support. I am writing so that anyone who wants to be ugly knows that they are being ugly to someone who is doing the very best she can and then just maybe they can have a little empathy.
I don't come home at night and cry on someone's shoulder. I work long hours. I live on the opposite side of the country from my family. No one pats me on the head and says, "It's okay, they're just out to get you." At the end of the day, I take these bullets alone and resolve to keep giving this career of mine 110%. I'm not saying I'm brave - a lot of women go it alone for much more noble causes. I'm just saying that I cannot do any better than the job I do now. I go to sleep at night exhausted knowing that I gave it all I had. If that isn't enough, please kindly remove me from your peripheral Web vision.
I know its easy to ask the naysayers to go away and that they probably won't. I know that as my career grows, I will deal with this more and more. I also know that the people whom I am referring to are what my friends and I call a Lame Barnacle: someone so committed to their own misery that their lameness is calcified. Not only are they indefinitely lame, they stick to you like a barnacle and are hard to pry off. I believe the Lame Barnacle imagery is so powerful that I even bought the URL lamebarnacle.com. I don't know if I'll ever do anything with it but the women in my life find the moniker highly relatable. But I digress.
In conclusion, Twitter Lame Barnacles, I know I should ignore you. After all, as one viewer wrote me today, "for every douche, there are 20 non-douches." In real life, my track record for distinguishing the douches from the non-douches is bad. That's why I don't date. But on Twitter, the douches have their peacock feathers clearly fanned. I know who you are. I do not appreciate you. I would love an invitation to sit and have tea in your glass house someday. Meanwhile, stop pulling my hair!
[gallery link="file" columns="4"]
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