Why you should block big corporations on Twitter
This is You Won't Regret It, a new weekly column featuring recommendations, tips, and unsolicited advice from the Mashable culture team.
Nothing feels better than blocking an obnoxious branded Twitter account — whether you're doing it to spite Alex Jones, to protect yourself from insidious marketing, or some combination of the two.
Look at what's happening on Twitter, for example. As we reported earlier this month, #GrabYourWallet co-founder Shannon Coulter recently put pressure on the platform to remove Jones by creating a list of Fortune 500 companies on Twitter that people can block in protest.
SEE ALSO: Twitter punishes Alex Jones—but he's still not banned
Using Block Together, any Twitter user can block a number of accounts all at once. Coulter created a customized block list of companies and made it available for download on site. The idea, Coulter wrote in a Medium post, is "to remove access to that time and attention until Jones is shown the door." Should Twitter ban Jones from the platform, Coulter says she'll "immediately unblock all the companies on this list, which means that you will too — instantly & automatically." More than 71,000 people have reportedly downloaded her list already.
But even after this campaign is long over, I recommend making your own list and banning corporations from your timeline, one account at a time.
My feed has been virtually ad free since joining #BlockParty500 💜 https://t.co/1YrzcGX23v
— kswolfley (@kswolfley) August 19, 2018
Brands rule my Twitter life. I followed each and every turn of the Wendy's vs. IHOP drama. I've been known to retweet the MoonPie account. My politics are far too close to that of a dictionary's, and that's upsetting. So I'm making a change.
By blocking some of these mega-corporations, we make it just a little bit harder for them to penetrate each and every part of our private lives. I don't want the Oscar Meyer Wienermobile account to be able to look at my Twitter feed and see how I feel about family separation policy. I don't want Chick-fil-A — with its disturbing record on a lack of support for LGBTQ rights — looking at me at all.
And while I'm sure the massive social media companies I've given my information to have already mined my data for all it's worth and sold it to the most ravenous companies in the world, it feels good to give a little "F U" to giant companies who want nothing more than to sell me something via Twitter marketing.
Small victories are sometimes the only thing we have.
My goal for 2018 is to follow the humans who deserve it the most: journalists with good scoops and hot people. I don't want brands even looking at me, unless it's to offer discount essential oil diffusers. It's impossible, I know, to go #NoLogo on all brands, but anything we can do to separate ourselves from mendacious corporations is a step in the right direction.
Block some corporations today. Your Twitter feed deserves it.
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