January 29, 2010 | Heroes
As children, neither of us went to the type of schools where every kid goes home with a trophy on track and field day and even if you don’t win the 100-meter dash, you still get to go home with a “compos mentis” ribbon affixed to your shirt. It’s probably because of these rough childhoods full of recognition only won in principals’ offices that we place such a premium on awards of any type, even those for which we have little respect or any hope of winning, such as the Shorty Awards.
The Shorty Awards have nothing to do with the hip hop use of the term to refer to women, including, we would assume, some who are taller than the speakers. Presumably they have their awards show sometime around the Oscars. The Shortys recognize Twitter users for the “Best producers of short, real time content 140 characters or less”, or, what you’d rather not hear when haggling with your insurance company and they hang up on you.
We are now, like a bird that’s flown into a bay window, tweeting more than ever, (click here for our Twitter page) but we still see the whole enterprise as a kind of never-ending Facebook status update purgatory. That said, we welcome your Shorty votes for us in the humor category – Here is the link. We promise to bring it down from the inside if we take home a plaque and if we win, to Frisbee-style, hurl it off the balcony. We also vow to shout 140-character-plus obscenities over the band trying to play us off. (Note: You can also vote for us in the “year’s best egocentric person” category too, even though there are technically [and by any other measure of reality] two of us).
The following is our Interview with the Shorty Awards, in true Twitter form, restricted to 140 characters or less (we weren’t being curt with the interviewer).
What’s your best tweet?
Don’t know, but it would take a disreputable pet store’s worth of dead budgies to replicate.
What are six things you could never do without?
blood flow to the brain, water, food, a toothbrush, pliers and a fake passport.
How do you use Twitter in your professional life?
To shamelessly promote ourselves, our writing, our website and our proven way to lose inches off your waist
What’s your favorite Twitter app?
The term ‘app’ is enough to make anyone throw app
Twitter or Facebook?
That is like choosing among your children, if one of them wasn’t dead… so Twitter.
What was the funniest trend you’ve seen?
The overwhelming juggernaut that is thesharkguys.com. The internet is the levee to our ‘Hurricane Katrina of comedy’ website
What feature should Twitter add?
The ability to become self-aware.
Who do you wish had a Twitter feed but doesn’t?
God. Example Tweet: Currently prepping the next tsunami.
What are some words or phrases you refuse to shorten for brevity?
Quotes from Sir Winston Churchill. “It is a good thing for an uneducated man to read books of quotations” but he was not referring to Twitter
Is there someone you want to follow you who doesn’t already? If so, who?
We don’t know but they better undergo a criminal background check first.
Have you ever unfollowed someone? Who and why?
You cannot ‘unfollow’ someone. The opposite of following is running in random directions and there is no word for that.
Why should we vote for you?
Because The Shark Guys are unquestionably the finest thing to hit Twitter since JD Salinger hit the floor
Terms you wish would start trending on Twitter right now?
The phrase ‘A hematoma is characterized by swelling of the injured area’
What’s the most interesting connection you’ve made through Twitter?
That it counters Camus’ ‘passionate world of indifference’—sort of
Hashtag you created that you wish everyone used?
We don’t know what that is, but it’s illegal to be caught with it in Singapore.
How do you make your tweets unique?
By liberally misquoting the Book of Mormon
What inspires you to tweet?
A neural impulse traveling from the brain (generally a good place for neural impulses to generate) makes our fingers type out things.
Ever get called out for tweeting too much?
Yes, but bear repellent is equally effective on humans.
140 characters of advice for a new user?
Do not hesitate to post incriminating photos of people in powerful positions in various positions.
How long can you go without a tweet?
Depends on whether the facility is medium or minimum security
What question are we not asking here that we should?
Will Tweets eventually bring about World Peace or cast the yoke of oppression off the people of Tibet? In a word, yes.
Who do you admire most for his or her use of Twitter?
Michael McKean because This is Spinal Tap is possibly the greatest movie ever and he Tweeted one of our posts.
Why’d you start tweeting?
The more important question remains, when are we going to stop?
Has Twitter changed your life? If yes, how?
It’s irrevocably altered the way we view the color ‘teal’.
What do you wish people would do more of on Twitter?
Tweet during minor surgical procedures or better yet, from the electric chair
How will the world change in 2010?
Average global temperatures will either rise or fall.
What are some big Twitter faux pas?
Describing bowel movements using forlorn adjectives
What will the world be like 10 years from now?
Nostalgic for 2010 when Tweets were 140 characters instead of 63 a decade into the future
