I?VE been urged over and over again to start my own Twitter page by friends and colleagues. I?m fond of putting strange and absurd status updates on my Facebook page, and I?ve been known to be occasionally funny with my sarcastic or snarky one-liners.

But when I took a quick look at the Twitter pages of other people and of the status updates in my contact list on Facebook, I realized one thing: I?m sorry, I guess I?m just not that into knowing what you had for breakfast and whether it was really yummy.

Twitter has allowed millions of people around the globe to put their byte-sized thoughts on the web. All of a sudden, it has become an age of needless self-promotion. The average Juan now enjoys a feeling of significance when his most mundane and banal activities find an audience on the web.

To make matters worse, these little 140 character musings on pretty much nothing important oftentimes get replied to.

Twitter does have its uses, and I can see how it can become an effective tool for a global exchange of ideas. A recent Time Magazine article said a conference on education in the United States was made public on Twitter, and people all over the world had a chance to offer their thoughts on the subject, making the symposium a more meaningful gathering and a true exchange of ideas.

Celebrities and artists also use Twitter to reinforce their connection with their fans. Also, the search function of the social networking application makes it easier to find ideas and links to other articles and websites related to whatever it is you are searching for. Yes, there are many great uses for Twitter indeed.

But if you ask me, for every one great tweet, there are two dozen useless ones that just take up web storage in some server in the US. What kind of depth can you really reach with 140 characters? Not everyone is capable of coming up with a thought-provoking sound bite.

Mini-stalking

As more and more people get into Twitter, the more they seem bound to their friends, and in a frightening way, to celebrities and artists whom they follow. It kind of promotes a new level of stalking, and adds to our obsessive-compulsive need to reach out to these stars and feel closer to them.

But, in truth, they are giving you the same information they make available to everyone on the Net!

I kind of like the blank spaces, the things we don?t really need to know about each other. It?s called personal space, and Twitter destroys this wall by making insignificant things seem more significant than they really are. There is too much information now out there that I don?t really want to know. That?s why I?m staying off it.

And as we become more and more attuned to reading 140-character thought crap (because, really, it?s just like pooping out the first thing that comes to mind), we start wanting our information in the same concise and terse way.

It?s like how the younger generation can only take a two-hour movie if it?s filled with non-stop action, because they are so used to watching everything MTV-style. You get the whole story in three and a half minutes, the average length of a song. A 10-minute dialogue scene becomes dragging and boring.

Our attention spans are getting shorter and shorter and we want things smaller and smaller. It?s the way of technology, but it shouldn?t be the way of information and certainly of personal relationships.

Old-fashioned

I guess I?m old-fashioned, but I really prefer to talk. I miss the days of long conversations on the landline phone until your ears are burning from the pressure. I like discussing things at length and actually seeing the person I?m talking to.

Now, it seems, it?s all short bursts of information. I guess I wasn?t made for this digital age.

It seems technology is hell-bent on keeping us in front of our computers and dealing with each other in cyberspace. But, in truth, I think I?d remember more being with a person and saying nothing than what he or she had tweeted the day before.

Tweeting doesn?t make us closer. Relationships are based on going through actual experiences with each other.

In fact, I?ve been blogging less and less now. I don?t feel inclined to put up my thoughts and feelings there because I?ve begun to think that, again, it?s just useless self-promotion?putting up bits of information that nobody is really interested in.

Now I?m more inclined to drop my already insignificant Internet time and spend more time talking to people. My funny one-liners are best when I can hear the laughter right after.