One of the practices widely used to build up influence on Twitter is using third party software to systematically add a large number of social connections each day, then breaking those connections with anyone who doesn’t reciprocate. Such a practice allows people to grow their list of followers fast and automatically without any close monitoring.

Some social media companies sell the dream of building an influential account for someone in few weeks without contributing any real content by using the above techniques for monitory compensation.

The question that comes to my mind is, when you are building these lists automatically and when you can build them that fast, are you monitoring whether you are adding real people or just hoaxes? [Read more…]