Twitter Mad

Being a magpie vs Being a human

With many programs emerging that claim to help you make money from your tweets, I have decided to take an eagle eye look at the Be-a-magpie program.

The be-a-magpie system is a program that allows tweeters to “profit” from their tweets. The tweeter signs-up, approves some “ads” to be tweeted, Selects his/her frequency (1 magpie tweet for every 10 tweets etc) and hey presto be-a-magpie updates your tweets for you automatically and then your rollin’ in it. (or so it seems)

Across the web, bloggers and twitter fans have raised the ethical and moral issue behind selling your tweets (read more at readwriteweb.com) That is, like most issues, dependent on your moral beliefs.  I believe that almost everyone is marketing on twitter (their own products, other peoples’ products, their websites or indeed themselves!). While I think the be-a-magpie program is flawed, I say “If I can advertise in my blog post, why can’t I advertise in my micro-blog post?”.

Advertisers

Among the advertisers there are skype, Apple, roxio, adobe and box.net. Now I seriously doubt that apple or any other companies are advertising with Be-a-Magpie. Some have suggested it could be affiliates. I doubt that also.

I think the people behind be-a-magpie are throwing up these “ads” as a demonstration or an example for the advertisers. I doubt they have any advertisers at all.

Now I could be wrong on that  but I highly doubt that serious multinational companies are advertising with them.It would be a foolish move on their behalfs.

And Here is why I wouldn’t advertise with this fundamentally flawed program;

1) All tweet-ads are the same.

I imagine the purpose behind these ads is that they feel like recommendations or testimonial type. Word of tweet almost. This is exceptionally flawed by the simple fact that all tweets are the same. The recommendations and word-of-mouth type of approach will go seriously unnoticed.

2) Twitter is a community based chat.

Imagine having a chat in real life where after every ten sentences your friend spurts out some random ad right there in the middle of your conversation. You’d simply walk away and not listen.  In twittersphere, your followers will unfollow you and the ad will see less screens.

3) Why pay for it?

Just get a twitter account (free) and tweet yourself (also free).

4) You don’t know who is tweeting about it.

What if some racist,sexist or nazi is tweeting and suddently he’s promoting your product?

Tweeters- Using be-a-magpie as a tweeter-

As someone who has an interest in all things twitter, I felt I had a responsibility to test it. And here is my verdict: Poor. (in other words; FAIL). While the site is clean and neat looking. Under the hood lies problems, and many of them.

There is a considerable lack of required information for the tweeters. The FAQ is targeted more towards the advertiser and by doing so neglects the tweeter. It took me ages to actually know what’s going to happen and when. On top of that, I have no idea of what time the tweet will go out,

The Account information is virtually non-existent: I’ve been on the program now for a week and I have tweeted several times with the service and nothing is displaying in my account activity.

With the lack of information, be-a-magpie are neglecting their tweeters. Something foolish and potentially destroying. Without the tweeters they are nothing. They could have all the advertisers in the world but without tweeters there’s no point.

The be-a-magpie program is a flawed, poorly operated program that is not viable for the long term. I’m not against making money off twitter but I’m completely against flawed programs that shouldn’t have been available in such a poor, unusable condition.

Let the Tweeter Beware.