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Twitter

December 23, 2008 by Nathan Bransford 24 Comments

Hello! You might have been surprised to notice that there was a Twitter feed started in my name. Well, I was as surprised as you were!

If you are the industrious individual who started this feed, could you please shoot me an e-mail? I won’t send the Feds, I promise.

And yes, I know this is probably a sign I should join the dark side. If I get my name back.

Thank you!

PS: Also, thanks so much to Josephine and Colleen for their help on this!

Filed Under: Social Media Tagged With: Twitter

Reader Interactions

Comments

  1. Polenth says

    December 23, 2008 at 5:00 am

    Yes, join the dark side! You want to know what we’re all eating for dinner…

    Reply
  2. Josephine Damian says

    December 23, 2008 at 5:15 am

    Polenth! You know darn well we talk about far more interesting things there besides what we have for dinner. lol

    Nathan: I do hope the Twitter administrators suspend that imposter’s account and then let you have access to the name/URL so you can join for real.

    Lots of other agents are (genuinely) there as well as publishers, editors, reviewers and of course a big bunch of Nate-blog peeps like me and Polenth.

    Reply
  3. sex scenes at starbucks says

    December 23, 2008 at 7:43 am

    You realize that this means you are Famous.

    Impostinatored on Twitter. I’m so jealous…

    word ver:

    exiest (combo: exist, sexiest. Hmmm…)

    Reply
  4. Tracey S. Rosenberg says

    December 23, 2008 at 9:45 am

    Oh, heavens, I never suspected it wasn’t you – I just thought you’d created a savvy way for people to check when you updated your blog. (It’s possible that this is the non-malicious reason the feed was created. I hope that’s the case.)

    Anyway, I hope you get it sorted and it would be lovely to follow the REAL Nathan Bransford on Twitter. 🙂

    Reply
  5. the Amateur Book Blogger says

    December 23, 2008 at 10:02 am

    Scary – identity theft wherever you go! Who has enough time on their hands to pretend to be someone else on Twitter! And not very smart, or they’d have realised that everyone would know you would have blogged about it HERE first!

    Happy Holidays!

    Reply
  6. Zoe Winters says

    December 23, 2008 at 11:13 am

    Unless it’s someone specifically posing as Nathan the agent, it’s possible that there’s another person named Nathan Bransford out there and that it’s not an attempt at identity theft.

    Not trying to be persnickety, just saying. I ran into a few other Zoe Winters’s too.

    Reply
  7. Zoe Winters says

    December 23, 2008 at 11:15 am

    *facepalm*

    Okay, well maybe I should check the link before I say something. der. haha. Anyway, so yeah, not a case of someone else with the name, but someone linking to the blog and such.

    It’s a nice thought, but it would be cool to have the actual Nathan Bransford on twitter.

    Reply
  8. clindsay says

    December 23, 2008 at 12:02 pm

    No, it’s someone who has hijacked Nathan’s name and is using it to post an RSS feed from Nathan’s blog. It was probably done in the same spirit as someone who would set up a LiveJournal feed for a blog, but the difference is that on Twitter, the creator of the feed can also post, thus leaving this open to abuse. On LiveJournal, it’s very clear when something is simply a feed.

    Regardless, it is inappropriate to hijack someone’s professional persona, no matter how well intentioned it may have been.

    Nathan, do let me know if you are able to get the feed shut down and if/when you start up your real Twitter feed so I can spread the word.

    Happy Holidays, sir!

    Colleen

    Reply
  9. AstonWest says

    December 23, 2008 at 12:05 pm

    Just realize that if you do begin Twittering, what little free time you may have had just went out the window.

    🙂

    Reply
  10. sylvia says

    December 23, 2008 at 12:12 pm

    Well at least whoever it is has not put any words into your mouth!

    I hope you get it sorted soon.

    Reply
  11. disorderly says

    December 23, 2008 at 1:55 pm

    Shouldn’t that be the “dork” side?

    (Hey, don’t glare at me! I’m on there!)

    Reply
  12. Jose Mojica says

    December 23, 2008 at 2:00 pm

    Actually, it may be better to select a shorter twitter name anyway. When people reply to your twitters they get 140 characters and your name becomes part of the message. So if you have a long name it will take away from the length of the reply. Of course, I would still report the person and make sure the name is not misused.

    Reply
  13. FrostingandFire says

    December 23, 2008 at 2:03 pm

    Oh, that is a bit creepy, eh!? Eeeeeeek. I hope the Twitter lines are at least very clever, or energetic and amusing, if they have your name? Nothing worse than a bland, vanilla-witted identity thief to make a good name go bad. Good luck with that.
    zo

    Reply
  14. Tracy Marchini says

    December 23, 2008 at 2:16 pm

    Although, this does mean you have even more in common with Don Draper — he had a twitter impostor as well!

    Reply
  15. Genie Sea says

    December 23, 2008 at 2:34 pm

    I discovered your blog through Rebecca, and I find Twitter madness. 🙂 Of course, I had to investigate this twitterimposter, and I wind up signing up on twitter too. Really? Now look what I got myself into. More onlinery.

    At east they are just posting what’s on your blog, not making up events like trying on women’s lingerie. Heh! Good luck in sorting this mess out and regaining control of your twitterindentity. 🙂

    Reply
  16. Kathleen Peacock says

    December 23, 2008 at 2:51 pm

    You don’t have to necessarily join the dark side. Just have an account so that a: it will be there if you do want it and b: no one else can have it.

    I’ve got accounts under my name and the user name I use on LiveJournal even though I’m not actively using the service.

    Reply
  17. ryan field says

    December 23, 2008 at 3:08 pm

    It’s a little creepy to know that this can be done. I’d get that feed shut down fast.

    Have a good holiday.

    Reply
  18. Kathryn711 says

    December 23, 2008 at 3:16 pm

    The same thing happened to the artist Jenny Holzer. There’a twitter feed with over 1,000 followers that’s not her.

    I’m not sure if you can just “shut it down”, it will be interesting to see.

    Reply
  19. dark_opus says

    December 23, 2008 at 3:58 pm

    From what I’ve seen so far, the Twitter-Meisters seem to be reacting in nimble fashion to complaints about abuse. Hopefully, this will get resolved in short order.

    Of course, if you assimilate this imposter, you might pull off the equivalent of virtual cloning. Could be handy.

    Reply
  20. Steppe says

    December 23, 2008 at 5:40 pm

    Wow. The information virea are spawning
    mutant ninja Nathans. Good god old chum what is it all coming to.

    Nice to know you don’t twitter.
    Do you tweeter? Do you twatter?

    Ahhh the good old days when authors were mysterious figures who penned their little tombs and let them sally forth unprotected by a rising dead sea of useless information.

    Wanna know what I did thirty seconds ago… huh huh huh. Look above
    Wanna know what I did forty-five seconds ago…etc. etc

    You have been a very good and wise information filter for me Mr Nathan.
    I do not have the time or inclination to know all that you know. I’ve yet to lose faith in your overview but if I had…

    Finding out you don’t twitter would put you firmly back on the road to literary redemption.

    Since I started reading about the publishing business circa 04-01-2008
    I have kept an open mind and an open trash can. I am on my third set of oversized can liners.

    Insert ad hominem:
    “Imitation is the sincerest form of flattery.” Lord only knows what happens when they find out Nathan The First is unrelated to Nathan The Second.
    A veritable verifiable virtual veritas of verification flying asunder in polemic pandemics of pandoric punditry.
    Henry The Ninth all over again.

    Alliteration or a littered nation.
    You decide. Update at eleven.

    Merry Christmas, Happy Hanukkah and a rocking good New Year.

    PS I finished my 220,000 word tomb on the end and rebirth of the world. Proofread five times. Nary a comma misplaced nor a word mispelled. I’ll query in mid-january.

    Art

    Reply
  21. Polenth says

    December 23, 2008 at 7:25 pm

    Josephine Damian wrote:
    Polenth! You know darn well we talk about far more interesting things there besides what we have for dinner. lol

    That’s true. I was talking about my ear twitching last night.

    Reply
  22. Elyssa Papa says

    December 23, 2008 at 8:36 pm

    I saw your name on Twitter and thought it odd, especially since I remembered you blogging about Twitter and Facebook. I hope it all gets settled for you.

    Reply
  23. Other Lisa says

    December 23, 2008 at 10:11 pm

    Wow, that is creepy. But I’ve noticed that Twitter is really on the ball with suspending suspect accounts – faster than just about any such service I’ve encountered. You are NOT allowed to impersonate other people – all you have to do is contact them and they’ll suspend it. I am reasonably confident of this.

    And, yeah…join us in the Twitterverse! It’s fun! I like the way I can feed my tweets to my blog, and I’ve gotten some really great content from people I follow. A lot of publishers are getting into the act, and what’s cool is that they follow back as well.

    Reply
  24. c says

    December 24, 2008 at 12:35 am

    Hi there, I work at Twitter, and a nice person (@ArachneJericho) let me know that you are having troubles with an impersonation account. Impersonation isn’t allowed on Twitter unless it’s a parody.

    In this case, it looks like someone set up a feed with your blog posts, something you can do via Twitterfeed, a 3rd party application that allows you to post a Twitter update when you update your blog.

    If you aren’t able to get ahold of the account owner (who probably doesn’t log in much, as Twitterfeed is automated) and would like to contact us for additional help, feel free to send me an email: crystal@twitter.com.

    Reply

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