When I logged into Twitter this morning I was happy to see that the number I was following was finally over 2000 – until I realized I didn’t follow those additional Tweeters. Just to be certain I did not follow anyone else today. My followers were sitting at 2009 this morning.
Now they are at 2018 and I didn’t follow any of those nine new Twitter users. There are three obvious potential causes:
- Twitter did it for me
- Someone has hacked my Twitter account
- Some third party tool is following people for me
Which do you think is most likely? My bet would be this one:
Twitter is auto-following Twitter users in our accounts
Why you may ask? Because it makes the most sense and they have a strong motive. Twitter could be selling followers to those willing to pay for the eyeballs. Even if they aren’t doing it now it would make sense that they may start doing this in the future.
I would love to know who those eight new people I’m following are. SocialToo (Twitter) sends me a daily email with who follows me and who unfollows me. Does anyone know of a Twitter app that can tell us?
Watch the number of Tweeters showing in Twitter following and see if it goes up when you’re not following. Then let us know. It would be very interesting to see how widespread this is.
