Comments on: Twitter’s New Retweet is Broken and How to Fix it

By: grigs

grigs — Thu, 07 Jan 2010 15:03:05 +0000

@LoganGreer If you are upgrading from Tweetie 1.0 to 2.1, yes your old version will remain on your phone. But what we're talking about is the upgrade from 2.0 to 2.1 where the retweet feature was released. Copy and paste doesn't address most of the issues I listed above. FWIW, the developer of Tweetie doesn't think the discussion is silly: http://twitter.com/tweetie/status/6240742965 http://twitter.com/tweetie/status/6241001152 http://twitter.com/tweetie/status/6241021911 In that last tweet, he talks about working with Twitter to get some of the suggestions in this article implemented.

By: grigs

grigs — Thu, 07 Jan 2010 14:54:31 +0000

@LoganGreer Given RT is a social convention with no central body that defines its use, there is no way it can be technically deprecated. We can simply continue to use the social convention.

FWIW, I have in fact read Chris Messina's post that you link to. Chris contradicts your comment about RT not having meaning:

"The concept is simple and already widely used: sometimes you want to give credit to someone (as part of the pay-it-forward link economy) for something they said or linked to, without quoting them verbatim (which is what RT or “retweeting” is for, in my estimation and use)."

Chris suggests as an alternative specifically because it has different meaning.

But realistically, this isn't a question of whether to use via vs. RT. The issues enumerated in the article like the lack of retweets showing up in lists and the fact that you can't get notification of retweets so that you can participate in the conversation are bigger issues than whether or not we use the word 'via' instead of 'RT.'

By: grigs

grigs — Thu, 07 Jan 2010 14:42:56 +0000

@LoganGreer How can an informal syntax that evolved through usage be deprecated? On whose authority?

FWIW, I've read Chris Messina's post. To your point of RT not meaning something, here is what Chris wrote:

So Chris himself makes a distinction between the two because they both have meaning, and he defines them differently.

But even so, Chris would be the first to tell you that his definitions are simply what he is suggesting, not some sort of central mandate.

By: @LoganGreer

@LoganGreer — Thu, 07 Jan 2010 07:31:02 +0000

1) "Upgrading" leaves the old Tweetie app on your phone (at least it did for me). No downgrade necessary.
2) You can still retweet you silly people! There's no need to give up the greatest Twitter client ever because of this! Just tap "Quote Tweet" and it will create a "/via" Tweet. AND you can also always just copy and paste; ever think of that? The old Retweet is just text! Jeez.

http://factoryjoe.com/blog/2009/11/08/new-microsy…

By: @LoganGreer

@LoganGreer — Thu, 07 Jan 2010 07:26:11 +0000

RT is technically deprecated. The "/via" syntax is better because it's more informative ("via" means something, RT does not) and allows for greater expression with a standardized form: /via /cc… etc.

Read this: http://factoryjoe.com/blog/2009/11/08/new-microsy… and open your mind.

By: Who Owns Your Retweet? « Cloud Four

Who Owns Your Retweet? « Cloud Four — Wed, 09 Dec 2009 03:11:01 +0000

[...] Twitter’s New Retweet is Broken and How to Fix it [...]

By: Ellis

Ellis — Mon, 07 Dec 2009 15:46:24 +0000

I gave up. Was spending too much time editing out the "via" and putting in the RT. As much as I loved Tweetie, it's now off of my iPhone. I went to Twitelator Pro. Not perfect, but better than Tweetie in it's current state. Amazing how one feature can mess up an otherwise great product for me to the point that I simply won't use it.

By: Wayan

Wayan — Fri, 04 Dec 2009 20:53:17 +0000

Yeah, expect I upgraded by syncing with iTunes or trust me, the pain of loosing all the data would be less than loosing what once was a single step RT. And I think I'll provide feedback in pure Twitter fashion - with a hashtag manifesto: #RTFAIL Manifesto: If you use new RT function, you are on my unfollow shortlist. I wanna see your face & added value in tweet

By: grigs

grigs — Fri, 04 Dec 2009 20:42:25 +0000

If you haven't synced yet and you upgraded on the phone, but not your computer, you can do what @hannahnicklin describes at http://twitter.com/hannahnicklin/status/618250409…

Note, doing so will delete all of Tweetie's data including save searches, settings and passwords. You'll have to reset all of those.

The other alternative is to stick with Tweetie and use the quote feature and edit if needed. Then provide feedback to Twitter (and by extension Tweetie). That's what I ultimately decided after struggling with whether or not I wanted to downgrade my version of Tweetie.

By: Wayan

Wayan — Fri, 04 Dec 2009 20:27:02 +0000

Oh dear god why didn't I read this before I upgraded Tweetie this morning. The app is now useless to me as I loved RT'ing with a bit of commentary in front – adding my own value. I loved it when others did the same too. A bare RT is spam to me.

Any way I can downgrade to the older tweetie version? Please tell me its possible…