Tweeting for twits: How not to annoy your audience

Are you annoying people with your behaviors on Twitter? This week's Twitter annoyances story focused on the technical aspects of Twitter, but some people with whom I spoke had plenty to say about Twitter etiquette - of the lack thereof. The problem has only gotten worse as the popularity of Twitter's service has climbed. Here's what bothers Margaret Wallace, CEO of online game software development company Rebel Monkey.

Calling yourself a "guru." Ever notice how many "gurus" are dispensing advice on Twitter? Wallace has. The most common: life coaches, and self-described experts in search engine optimization and social networking. But Wallace takes it all with sense of humor. "I take great comfort in the fact that there is a guru on Twitter for every aspect of my life."

Posting too many Tweets in rapid succession. "When I see folks posting 10 or 15 tweets all at once, and these are links to upsell something or point back to some Web site, I do find that a bit annoying," Wallace says.

Here are a few that bother Michaela Vorvoreanu, assistant professor at Purdue University's College of Technology. She studies the impact of Twitter and other communications technologies on the culture and society. In her own words the top annoyances are:

• Ego-tweeting: Bragging, self-promoting, feeling too good about oneself.
• Tweeting noise about current events. when people are not well informed (i.e. Iran elections) or are repeating information that is already widely available and not important to me (i.e. Michael Jackson).
• Tweeting about frustrations, repeatedly. It's OK to let off steam once in a while, but I don't need updates about every single step you're taking while standing in the airport security line (or any other line).
• Asking to be retweeted. Unless it's an emergency or an important public service announcement, I'd rather people leave it up to others' judgment whether to retweet or not
• Retweeting a lot. At some points some people's streams are full of retweets, and it makes me wonder if they have anything original to say?
• Auto-DMs, or DMs from people I've just followed, when we don't yet have a relationship.
• Memes. I don't like herd mentality.

On the bright side, tweeting while driving didn't make the list. At least not yet.