Have you ever received a DM (direct message) in your Twitter account similar to below (where userABC is someone you send a follow request to)?
“userABC uses TrueTwit validation service. Please follow this link so userABC can be sure you are a legitimate follower: http://truetwit.com/vy32859668 Thanks”
Woa! It was so cool I thought when I first encountered such Twitter validation service. Upon checking the TrueTwit website, the following were the exact words:
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Stop wasting time with spammers on twitter.
We will validate your followers so you don’t have to.
Twitter spam is a drag. What if you could know for sure that your followers are truly human, and not some cyborg? TrueTwit is designed to help you:
- Verify people from robots
- Avoid Twitter spam
- Save time managing your followers
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Since you want to follow userABC, you happily click the link and will be brought to their website for validation where you have to enter some letters or numbers in a CAPTCHA box to prove that you are real human being and not a robot such as one below.
Objectives of TrueTwit
The noble objective of using TrueTwit is to stop spammers especially those robots who send out auto-DMs to follow you so that you will not be followed by spammers/robots.
Downsides of TrueTwit
Yes, you will be relieved of the chore of validating your prospective follower is a real human being. However there are some downsides of using this service:-
- If your follower is not keen to go through the cycle of entering the CAPTCHA box, you would “lose” a follower.
- Some real spammers don’t use robots and they actually will take the trouble to fill up the CAPTCHA box and TrueTwit will just allow them to follow you. Thereafter, the spammers will still be in your followers list and they still can spam you with DMs and their tweets will still appear in your timeline.
- So validating followers doesn’t have anything to do with reducing spammers as mentioned in item 2. The most it can prove is the follower is a real human being.
- It is like you are spamming your prospective follower with a DM to validate himself where in the first place the prospective follower does not even spam you! He is just trying to follow you, that’s all, maybe he likes your tweets and would like to be your Twitter friend!
Why I don’t use TrueTwit
At first I was so tempted to use this service but when I Googled the internet, I found more negative remarks than positive ones. I changed my mind when I kept receiving DMs from TrueTwit asking me to validate myself when trying to follow a user who has signed up TrueTwit. What the heck!
Twitter is a social networking service where things should be easy for everyone. It is pointless and annoying to follow someone who uses TrueTwit because you have to go through the cycle of filling up the CAPTCHA and wait for the user to “approve” your follow.
The big flaw is anybody can sign up TrueTwit and get unverified access to all those people who thought they were protected by joining TrueTwit in the first place.
Think about this: all the spammers can take advantage of the exempt rule and they can follow thousands of people and pass the real human test without even trying to go through the CAPTCHA test!
My two cents
If you are real paranoid of wanting to protect yourself from being followed by so called robots, go ahead. But before you sign up this service, the following websites should be visited by you. Read them and make a decision yourself.
http://jinchelan.com/truetwit-sucks.html
http://yukaichou.com/twitter-apps/truetwit-defeats-purpose-helping-spammers/
http://thechrisvossshow.com/in-my-opinion-i-dont-like-truetwit-service/
Happy tweeting my teh tarik kakis! Feel free to follow me at twitter.com/ufmmtan and I shall NOT ask you to verify whether you are human being!
Tags: captcha, direct message, DM, follow, followers, following, paranoid, spam, spammers, teh tarik kaki, TrueTwit, tweeting, twitter, validation
