Scoble Not The Only One Affected by Twitter Cap
Back in June Twitter’s fail whale was getting more lift than a Beverly Hills house wife. At the same time the Twitter spammers were coming out of the wood work. I called for a follow cap of 5000 people — a similar number to the Facebook friends one user could have at the time. I figured it would reduce spam.
Now Twitter has instituted a cap at 2000.
That is great. Unless you are Chris Webb — an editor at Wiley.
Chris has tweeted nearly 4000 times. A clear sign of an enthusiastic early adopter. 1500 people follow him. He follows 2000 people in return.
Why so many? I think the talk of 2000 people being impossible to follow is crap. Chris’s business is connecting writers with markets. He needs a big intake scoop. Just look at his authority ranking on Technorati — it is five times what Joe Wikert’s is. I would speculate that is because Joe doesn’t connect with as many folks using Twitter (and other tools) as Chris does.
For Chris, following that many people is just good business.
The solution: for users with large follow counts use a percentage differential between following and followed so that — after the 2000 follower — you could only add upto 15% more people than are following you.
I imagine there are very few people that are following 2000 people legitimately. It is a shame Chris is being punished when he clearly is not in the wrong.
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