Helpful Hints from joeeze: How to privately direct message on Twitter

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I've always wondered at exchanges on Twitter which clearly indicate that people are replying to other  people individually.

I mean, I see how you can direct message someone who's following you via a direct link on their home page but what about the zillions of other people on Twitter who've never heard of you but for one reason or another you want to contact?

I remained in the dark about how to do this until I read Jessica E. Vascellaro's article in yesterday's Wall Street Journal headlined "Why Email No Longer Rules."

Buried deep within the piece was this: "You can... send private 'direct messages' through the system by typing d and the user name."

Who knew?

But I still wasn't clear about how to do it even with those instructions.

It's a TechnoDolt™ thing.

So I had a look at the stuff under "Help" on my Twitter homepage, and over on the right at #7 on a list of articles was "What are Direct Messages?"

I clicked on it and got the page up top.

I thought I understood so I typed d+bookofjoe+ in the Twitter box but nothing happened.

When in doubt, reread the instructions.

This time I looked at the example (above) and saw where you don't actually use the + sign.

Doh.

I tried that and sure enough, as soon as I'd finished typing d and then left a space, the word "update" under the "What are you doing?" box changed to "send" and the "What are you doing" changed to "Direct message."

Easy as pie.

If I can do it, anyone can.

STOP PRESS

Alas, it turns out that Ms. Vascellaro's instructions neglected to mention the fine print, namely that if someone isn't following you — which for most people is most people — you're out of luck when it comes to direct messaging them.

You have to go the public route, i.e., @.

Oh well, it sure was fun while it lasted.