Let me also say that this comment is not directed at any particular person or group - I have seen it a LOT. From a lot of different groups.
Now, on with the blog post.
"Air Quote" - A tweet that's directed at another RPer, but there's no @. Sometimes no name is mentioned, either.
This is different from what our RP group calls a "stand-alone tweet." A stand-alone is more like a monologue. We use it when we are trying to either convey the thoughts of the character or if we are trying to make sure that followers are up to speed on what has happened already in a storylines. They are used to try to help followers to understand what's going on, and generally are used as some type of explanation.
These are particularly helpful in a long or complicated storyline, especially if something profound has happened and if followers missed that crucial development, they'll have trouble following the SL. They can also be helpful when you are trying to set up the scene.
There are some groups who will also make tweets that are not really directed towards anyone, but they are basically breaking down the fourth wall temporarily and making a comment to followers - again, it's generally to let the followers know what the character is thinking, or maybe what the writer is thinking.
Air quotes are entirely different.
There are times when two or more characters will have an entire conversation without a single @ reply.
If you are following everyone involved, it's hilarious. If you are not following one or more characters in the conversation, it's very confusing and annoying.
What makes it worse is that you can't follow the person that the other one is talking to because you don't have a username mentioned. What makes it even worse than that if the name that is used in the air quotes is the name of more than one character, so you don't have any idea of who you need to follow.
I have checked the profiles of people doing this so that I can find out who the air quotes are directed to and follow that person, and that is also a lesson in frustration many times. I can't find the username of the person they're talking to! They have used all air quotes! If they don't have too many people that they are following, then I can try and go down their followers and try and find out who I need to follow, but sometimes that doesn't work either.
Then I will try and find a list so that I can see the entire conversation and see who is speaking to whom. That does not work very often, either.
I love to find new role players to follow. I love to watch role-playing scenes and storylines. But it's very difficult to follow along in situations where you're only seeing half or one third of a conversation and you have no way of knowing who the other person is.
I know that sometimes it's hard when one person in a conversation has fewer followers than another. The only people that will see the conversation (if you @ the other person at the beginning of the tweet) are followers that follow both characters. This can be especially difficult if it's a new character and has only a handful of followers.
What we will do in that case is to have the user name at the end of the tweet. Or somewhere in the middle. Or whatever. But we always try to tag the person being spoken to somewhere in the tweet.
This actually does two things.
1. It's a courtesy to the followers - they can see who you're talking to and they can follow that person if they choose.
2. It also helps to build a follower count for other people. I know that there are times when @SharaTheOrion interacts with new people and the new person will get followers simply because she's interacting with them and people see that there is a new role player around. Or maybe not even a new person, but someone that they haven't seen before.
Again, I am not saying that people have to do what I suggest. I'm just saying that if I'm having this kind of frustration, I imagine that other people are, too.
