Topic: The creeping silent army of the ether (Twitter-Whoppery)

[Son of Spion]

The concept of 90 plus minutes of two teams playing football is lost amongst all the punditry, transfer fury, banter, post match analysis and all the other crap.

I put the bins out or wash the dishes or some other mundane tasks and turn the telly on just in time for kick off. Turn it off at half time, back on again for the second half and off at full time.

I feel similar to Meady and yourself.

Thankfully, I've never had Twitter or Facebook accounts, so I manage to swerve most of the utter shite out there. Just seeing some of the stuff reposted on here and stuff Mrs Spion tells me about (she has accounts and views but doesn't post anymore) I know I made the right decision in not getting involved with it all.

I, too, hate what football has become. I loathe the circus, the moronic punditry, the 'bantz' etc... If it wasn't for Klopp and LFC I'd have binned the whole sorry mess off long ago. Even now, I'll turn on at kick off and off at the final whistle. The rest is just tedious nonsense peddled by tedious people wrapped up in their own self importance.

To me, the beauty of football was in its simplicity. A bit like how you can appreciate a fine wine or beer and enjoy it for what it is. You really don't need to be a pretentious arsehole about it and analyse it to death, looking for things that aren't there just so you can waffle on about them and feel knowledgeable and important. All that matters is the wine or, in this case, the game. The rest is just noise made by people too fond of their own voices.

A simple thing like David Fairclough putting the ball away then wheeling away in celebration against St. Etienne is something that will stay with me until the day I die. That's the beauty of football. Raw, real, honest. It never needed the circus in order to make it special. It just was. Now, the game is lost amongst the hype, the smoke and mirrors. The moronic punditry. The so-called banter, the social media airheads who pump out endless drivel.

The good thing is that most of it can be avoided. Yes, it's out there if you look for it, but it can be swerved if you are determined to swerve it. Twitter and suchlike may well be a cesspool, but one we don't really have to step into. Pre and post game punditry can be avoided too. Inane, biased, miserable commentary can be harder to swerve, but plenty put local radio commentary on whilst turning the TV sound off.

We shouldn't really have to go to such lengths to try to retain our interest in the game, but it's often worth it. I've wanted to walk away from the circus for a long time now, but I'd have missed out on Klopp and the magnificent squad he's built. There is something real about him. Something worth sticking around for. He's also built something worth sticking around for too. If filtering out all the tedious shite surrounding the game is what it takes in order to retain my investment, then so be it. All things considered, the only thing that really matters is the 90+ minutes on the pitch. I don't care about the rest. No way am I putting myself through the rest of the circus. Like in many aspects of life, I think we have to learn how to filter out the shite so we can focus on the good. If others want to swim in the cesspool then that's their business. We don't have to join them though.

[royhendo]

The thing is, it's always been there. Rashid has always been there. Corballyred has always been there. The Greek fella. He used to email people before there was twitter.

[Black Bull Nova]

The thing is that when Twitter etc started off it did not seem that serious and was a sort of alternative reality. What has happened in recent years is that it has become reality for many people. As someone who remembers life before social media, who never uses a mobile, who has no twitter, facebook, instagram or whatever other magical ego vehicles exist these days (but is IT literate) then I look at that world which has grown with some contempt.

It has essentially created a divergence between two groups in society, those who wish to expand their minds and discover new things and new worlds, who see it as a vehicle to satisfy their curiosity. Secondly those who have gone inward, who now have a narrow path with they retread with irrelevant and tedious worlds dominating their attention to the exclusion of nearly all else.

The rise of the internet has been both wonderful and extremely damaging but it is the choices that people make that do the damage, not the medium. If you went into a forest and shouted as loudly as you wanted how you felt, no-one would here you. Twitter should be like that as well, if you follow someone, they own your attention, devote it to something else. If you express an opinion in order to demand attention, don't be surprised if knobheads sense your existence.

Bin it all and get on with something else, a fire does not burn without oxygen.

(Aside from RAWK of course which is bastion of intelligent conversation)



One of my favourite birthday cards

I'm also with Son of Spion about football, luckily, 15 miles from Anfield we have Rugby League, it keeps you grounded


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KU_7uGuIaJk

[Fitzy.]

Lots of cracking replies in here.

Despite the illusion at play, it is just about the 90mins. It can’t not be really. The circus around it doesn’t exist without the 90. After the dust has settled on another transfer window, it’s the results of 90min football matches that dictate everything else.

As captivating as some find the whoppery of Twitter, there’s no reality there. Just a bit of fragility of the human spirit needing to be heard while following the herd.

[lamonti]

it's easy to blame it all on Twitter kids but there are plenty of whoppers on the more serious forums and at the match too, we just laugh them off.

the internet culture is part of football now. a lot of this also echos with younger matchgoing fans too if you speak to them.

There's a large set of whoppers, of which Twitter-whoppery is a subset.

Then there's a subset of Twitter whoppers which I really think is what's being discussed. IMHO it's a cousin of gaming culture and chan culture and I wouldn't be surprised if it's a source of a lot of the racist abuse that filters into black players: essentially children (whether under 18 or not) who have grown up on the internet acting without any consequence.

[lamonti]

Also: I've been a long time advocate of not watching the build-up or commentary afterwards.

In fact last year I just took to watching the game with the sound off given the option of fake crowds/empty stadiums with Tyler and Carragher/Neville.

I had the sound off when Alisson scored. Desperately reached for the volume button to make sure I hadn't gone fucking mad.

[jepovic]

One problem is that the mainstream media is picking up and blowing up these things out of proportion. You can have a few thousand people retweeting something, out of millions of fans, then suddenly there's a headline "huge outrage among LFC fans". Of course, this just encourages the twats. A few thousand people retweeting something is absolutely nothing and should be ignored, but it's such an easy story.

I have to say, when people tell me they read something on Twitter I lose a bit of respect for them. Maybe I'm old or arrogant.
Personally, it's easy to just not use Twitter, like I just don't drink bleach, but sadly it does affect media and politicians and eventually the real world.

[Fromola]

the internet culture is part of football now. a lot of this also echos with younger matchgoing fans too if you speak to them.

Younger fans have grown up with social media and can't just detach from it.

I know a lad who often slips into a conversation "I was arguing with some City fan on the internet last night" and despises Man City fans because of interactions on social media. This is now how fan rivalries are formed, through toxic arguments on Facebook pages or Twitter.

Also through lack of opportunity a lot of younger LFC fans have had the experience of just going to the match robbed off them, so their fandom is formed by arguing with Bluemoon185595993939 on Twitter, rather than shouting themselves hoarse at Anfield.

[Fromola]

Also: I've been a long time advocate of not watching the build-up or commentary afterwards.

In fact last year I just took to watching the game with the sound off given the option of fake crowds/empty stadiums with Tyler and Carragher/Neville.

I had the sound off when Alisson scored. Desperately reached for the volume button to make sure I hadn't gone fucking mad.

I've had the commentary off on our games for years because I hate listening to the shite the opposition fans come up with, most of it derogatory to us (usually poverty or 'is this a library' related) and not about supporting their team. Tyler getting more and more annoying and the banality of the Carragher/Neville banter years and general shithousery of Neville, while Carragher never sticks up for the club. And it was bad enough in the Gray and Keys era.

[67CherryRed]

I once got in to an argument on twitter with 'SilkyIlkay' and asked him how he slept at night with a name like that.

This is what Perez meant when he said modern fans are fans of players rather than clubs, but for the most part I think he's being very naïve. These virgins will create an account named after any random squad player just to get noticed, they have no extra love for that particular player.

The sooner people need to provide ID to use social media the better. Imagine finding out that your boss was 'SilkyIlkay' in his spare time.

[royhendo]

Also: I've been a long time advocate of not watching the build-up or commentary afterwards.

In fact last year I just took to watching the game with the sound off given the option of fake crowds/empty stadiums with Tyler and Carragher/Neville.

I had the sound off when Alisson scored. Desperately reached for the volume button to make sure I hadn't gone fucking mad.

I was the same mate and was the exact same at that point. I have the podcasts on a fair bit and yesterday the Echo podcast was almost entirely about something Neville had said, even going back to disprove a claim he'd made re predictions in previous years. The question that came to mind was, 'who cares?'. Gary Neville, Piers Moron, Katie Hopkins, and on it goes from there. There was an article about Influencers that kind of highlighted how it's surely going to run its course as a bubble filled with bubbles - an intermingling constellation of bubbles.

This is one of the wierdest articles I've ever read - all about TikTok and the notion of an Influencer economy. https://harpers.org/archive/2021/06/tiktok-house-collab-house-the-anxiety-of-influencers/

[Gray Hamster]

I was the same mate and was the exact same at that point. I have the podcasts on a fair bit and yesterday the Echo podcast was almost entirely about something Neville had said, even going back to disprove a claim he'd made re predictions in previous years. The question that came to mind was, 'who cares?'. Gary Neville, Piers Moron, Katie Hopkins, and on it goes from there. There was an article about Influencers that kind of highlighted how it's surely going to run its course as a bubble filled with bubbles - an intermingling constellation of bubbles.

This is one of the wierdest articles I've ever read - all about TikTok and the notion of an Influencer economy. https://harpers.org/archive/2021/06/tiktok-house-collab-house-the-anxiety-of-influencers/

This is a really easy one for me.

Influencers (that includes many pundits) greatest strength is the fickleness, naivety and ignorance of people who listen to them and are either incapable or choose not to factor in empathy and judgement to anything said. That’s why i ignore pretty much everything outside of this forum (and even some stuff in this forum).

Many people need to wake up, get a life, take many comments that they read with big pinches of salt and not give 90% of media and pundits the airtime to promote their bias shite.

Life will become so much easier and understandable for these people.   Is it going to happen....No.. because too many people are fickle, ignoramus and incapable of free and logical thought. Plus they focus and regurgitate what they want to hear

[Charlie Adams fried egg]

I was the same mate and was the exact same at that point. I have the podcasts on a fair bit and yesterday the Echo podcast was almost entirely about something Neville had said, even going back to disprove a claim he'd made re predictions in previous years. The question that came to mind was, 'who cares?'. Gary Neville, Piers Moron, Katie Hopkins, and on it goes from there. There was an article about Influencers that kind of highlighted how it's surely going to run its course as a bubble filled with bubbles - an intermingling constellation of bubbles.

This is one of the wierdest articles I've ever read - all about TikTok and the notion of an Influencer economy. https://harpers.org/archive/2021/06/tiktok-house-collab-house-the-anxiety-of-influencers/

The Podcastis a great example of media companies feeding off each other’s bullshit and creating what’s become known as “content”.
Echo is owned by Reach who have the objective of being the biggest non US owned media platform in the country. Their metric is visits, clicks and sign ups. You only have to see the mess they’ve made of dozens of once respected regional titles to give you an idea of what they value.
So them picking up on and then pushing Nevilles nonsense is as natural as night following day. It’s a good example of how agendas are set and can gain traction though, and Neville, idiot though he is knows this.
Keep that story going and the shambles that is Utd is kept out of the crosshairs.

From reading the replies here, there may well be a market for a different, more intelligent form of football broadcasting. That said though, it’s sad that long term fans are being denied the opportunity to enjoy full coverage of the reds.

[FlashingBlade]

Curse of the modern fan analysing everything.

[Gray Hamster]

It’s all about the clicks

Anything that anyone says can be contorted out of context in a headline.     Clicks make 💰

[Morgana]

Also: I've been a long time advocate of not watching the build-up or commentary afterwards.

In fact last year I just took to watching the game with the sound off given the option of fake crowds/empty stadiums with Tyler and Carragher/Neville.

I had the sound off when Alisson scored. Desperately reached for the volume button to make sure I hadn't gone fucking mad.

I can just picture this.

[Fitzy.]

The Podcastis a great example of media companies feeding off each other’s bullshit and creating what’s become known as “content”.
Echo is owned by Reach who have the objective of being the biggest non US owned media platform in the country. Their metric is visits, clicks and sign ups. You only have to see the mess they’ve made of dozens of once respected regional titles to give you an idea of what they value.
So them picking up on and then pushing Nevilles nonsense is as natural as night following day. It’s a good example of how agendas are set and can gain traction though, and Neville, idiot though he is knows this.
Keep that story going and the shambles that is Utd is kept out of the crosshairs.

From reading the replies here, there may well be a market for a different, more intelligent form of football broadcasting. That said though, it’s sad that long term fans are being denied the opportunity to enjoy full coverage of the reds.

I think fan media and some select podcasts fill the void. Neil Atkinson did a thread on twitter recently talking about the 'bespoke' nature of TAW - it's nuanced analysis because it has the time and scope to be. It's behind a paywall (mostly) so is preaching to the converted - we've signed up so that we can have the kind of evaluative football chat that is lacking on many other platforms.

While we're here - the Villa Podcast is a good shout and the likes of Second Captains is certainly well-considered stuff.

[red1977]

Attention seeking? if people feel that way, chat to other reds about it, on here is a great way to engage with other reds, talk to yer mates whatever, get some interaction that addresses how you feel with someone who cares. Twitter, (i guess). is full of people who arn't there for any real purpose other than to stick a quick line up to the world that says look at me.

We can live with it, it's real, they are there and Twitter wants it that way, they make their money off it. But yeah, anyone with an ounce of intelligence will just look the other way. The club might engage because Twitter followers etc is something they want, what they say isn't really that important. a load of guys on Twitter are pissed off the club didn't spend 100 million, ok what ever.

The mind boggles though, how people are. Nothing strange as folk.

We have all probably met them in the flesh as well, they slag Klopp off, say Man utd spending x amount is the way to go, telling you if youve been to Anfield then you are a real fan etc etc. pure bellism and preaching utter turd, showing off with little to 0 knowledge, you look at them in disbelief and take nothing from it at all. it is known, they are there and its not to be taken seriously. Good laugh taking the piss out of them though..

[Fitzy.]

We have all probably met them in the flesh as well, they slag Klopp off, say Man utd spending x amount is the way to go, telling you if youve been to Anfield then you are a real fan etc etc. pure bellism and preaching utter turd, showing off with little to 0 knowledge, you look at them in disbelief and take nothing from it at all. it is known, they are there and its not to be taken seriously. Good laugh taking the piss out of them though..

Yep. These people don’t actually do nuance. You see them tying themselves in knots, making angry points filled with logical fallacies and inaccuracies. But the one thing they’re not is being inhibited by their own intellectual shortcomings.

[Jwils21]

Great thread. Nice to see i'm not alone in switching on in time for kick off and ignoring all the "analysis" which is probably spoon fed to them anyway. I'm fairly confident that Souness is told by the Sky producers to slag Pogba off at any opportunity now that he gets attention for it on social media, same with Roy Keane being a general arsehole.

The eyes of the media must light up any time something dramatic happens, look at how many times Sky Sports mentioned the Pickford/Van Dijk incident afterwards. They do it because they know it guarantees them a discussion point and plenty of social media exposure. Same with commentary (Tyler & Neville are the worst for it), when something happens in a match they instantly start talking about either the narrative behind it or try to stir up some form of controversy. Take Salah's header against City a couple of years back, straight away Neville was on the "OOOOOOOH VAR WILL LOOK AT THIS OOOOOOH IS HE JUST OFFSIDE?!?!?!?!". There's no appreciation of the game by these clowns, just them grasping at any opportunity to provide a talking point. Or Arsenal Fan TV now overreacting to everything for the sake of "content".

All of it's done to create "exposure" and "content" and it works. The Twitter mob then lap it up and adopt these opinions as their own. I've noticed on Twitter that there seems to still be some absolutely appalling abuse directed towards Adrian, as the "football twitter" mob decided to descend on him after his performance against Atletico. Not that you want to see that sort of shite at all, but the fact that Loris Karius seems to get nowhere near the level of long-term abuse anymore after a significantly more high profile bad performance just shows how much this is a mob mentality rather than people with their own opinions.

It's not going to change though, because it works. It gets them attention and/or advertising revenue & money.

[Black Bull Nova]

But yeah, anyone with an ounce of intelligence will just look the other way.

That's the trouble is it not, for those who base their lives around a narrow path of Social Media, I think it actually reduces your intelligence, just look at info wars in the USA, low base of intelligence, eroded and enhanced.

I'm not saying dickheads were not about 40 years ago but then you could cross the road, just that these days we have supercharged dickheads now, with a public voice which you can switch off but then they infiltrate sensible conversations and genuine debate as well. Just look at BBC replies etc. They are everywhere now, like a bad science fiction film, rather than just wittering in to their dogs and equally dickhead mates as they would have had to 40 years ago.

"Whoppery", that's the word (for the less offensive ones at least)

[So… Howard Philips]

That's the trouble is it not, for those who base their lives around a narrow path of Social Media, I think it actually reduces your intelligence, just look at info wars in the USA, low base of intelligence, eroded and enhanced.

I'm not saying dickheads were not about 40 years ago but then you could cross the road, just that these days we have supercharged dickheads now, with a public voice which you can switch off but then they infiltrate sensible conversations and genuine debate as well. Just look at BBC replies etc. They are everywhere now, like a bad science fiction film, rather than just wittering in to their dogs and equally dickhead mates as they would have had to 40 years ago.

The BBC has an amazing knack of discovering Twitter influenced fuckwits when doing their vox pop.

The other night they had two raddled bleached blondes from 'Uddersfield' on ranting about all them Afghans coming over with not a word from the interviwer to challenge their distorted views.

[Jwils21]

There's a large set of whoppers, of which Twitter-whoppery is a subset.

Then there's a subset of Twitter whoppers which I really think is what's being discussed. IMHO it's a cousin of gaming culture and chan culture and I wouldn't be surprised if it's a source of a lot of the racist abuse that filters into black players: essentially children (whether under 18 or not) who have grown up on the internet acting without any consequence.

Is this where all the americanised shite comes from, do you think? Almost bordering on trash talk.

"The league ain't ready."
"Imagine thinking Player X is better than Player Y. There are levels to this game."
"Dead club"
"Ratio'd"

[Charlie Adams fried egg]

Great thread. Nice to see i'm not alone in switching on in time for kick off and ignoring all the "analysis" which is probably spoon fed to them anyway. I'm fairly confident that Souness is told by the Sky producers to slag Pogba off at any opportunity now that he gets attention for it on social media, same with Roy Keane being a general arsehole.

The eyes of the media must light up any time something dramatic happens, look at how many times Sky Sports mentioned the Pickford/Van Dijk incident afterwards. They do it because they know it guarantees them a discussion point and plenty of social media exposure. Same with commentary (Tyler & Neville are the worst for it), when something happens in a match they instantly start talking about either the narrative behind it or try to stir up some form of controversy. Take Salah's header against City a couple of years back, straight away Neville was on the "OOOOOOOH VAR WILL LOOK AT THIS OOOOOOH IS HE JUST OFFSIDE?!?!?!?!". There's no appreciation of the game by these clowns, just them grasping at any opportunity to provide a talking point. Or Arsenal Fan TV now overreacting to everything for the sake of "content".

All of it's done to create "exposure" and "content" and it works. The Twitter mob then lap it up and adopt these opinions as their own. I've noticed on Twitter that there seems to still be some absolutely appalling abuse directed towards Adrian, as the "football twitter" mob decided to descend on him after his performance against Atletico. Not that you want to see that sort of shite at all, but the fact that Loris Karius seems to get nowhere near the level of long-term abuse anymore after a significantly more high profile bad performance just shows how much this is a mob mentality rather than people with their own opinions.

It's not going to change though, because it works. It gets them attention and/or advertising revenue & money.

All on the money, but the bolded bit made me laugh because I brought it up on the Utd thread yesterday. It was the mix of hope and desperation in his voice which was funny. But... as so many people have mentioned on here, stuff like that just helps to kill the enjoyment for proper fans.
We'd just seen an almost carbon copy of the 7th v Spurs in 1978 which was viewed as one of the best goals ever seen at Anfield. Rather than appreciate the goal, the instant reaction is the hope that there's something wrong with it. If commentators can't hide their bias then they shouldn't be covering the game. But as a whole, we tolerate it so nothing changes. I don't give Sky any money and haven't for years, but if enough LFC fans boycotted Sky and told them why, then something would change.

[jepovic]

Twitter gets far too much attention for its size. It's a pretty small social media by usage now, not even top-10. Maybe 10% of the population uses it, but the journalists do and they are the superspreaders of nonsense.

[Jwils21]

All on the money, but the bolded bit made me laugh because I brought it up on the Utd thread yesterday. It was the mix of hope and desperation in his voice which was funny. But... as so many people have mentioned on here, stuff like that just helps to kill the enjoyment for proper fans.
We'd just seen an almost carbon copy of the 7th v Spurs in 1978 which was viewed as one of the best goals ever seen at Anfield. Rather than appreciate the goal, the instant reaction is the hope that there's something wrong with it. If commentators can't hide their bias then they shouldn't be covering the game. But as a whole, we tolerate it so nothing changes. I don't give Sky any money and haven't for years, but if enough LFC fans boycotted Sky and told them why, then something would change.

I think the bias exists because people don't like seeing us succeed. It wouldn't satisfy Sky's audience if they were bigging us up.

The twittersphere is fuelled by controversy, childish point scoring and hyperbole. It's a competition to see who can be the most controversial and prove the hate their rivals more.

[Libertine]

I seem to have a different Twitter experience to many.

Yes, it is full of idiots spouting shite, but you only see that if you actively look for it or make a decision to follow the idiots in the first place.

I follow something like 250 accounts, aside from people I know, mostly science/work, political pundits and some football-related accounts. So the timeline is managable and regularly provides interesting and thought provoking content. I'll occasionally click into threads depending on the tweet - if it's clear that it's full of shite, just click back straight away.

If you're always clicking on trending hashtags or the replies to every tweet by the LFC account, then what do you expect to see?

[Barneylfc∗]

I seem to have a different Twitter experience to many.

Yes, it is full of idiots spouting shite, but you only see that if you actively look for it or make a decision to follow the idiots in the first place.

I follow something like 250 accounts, aside from people I know, mostly science/work, political pundits and some football-related accounts. So the timeline is managable and regularly provides interesting and thought provoking content. I'll occasionally click into threads depending on the tweet - if it's clear that it's full of shite, just click back straight away.

If you're always clicking on trending hashtags or the replies to every tweet by the LFC account, then what do you expect to see?

I'm pretty much the same. I have more on my blocked list than accounts I'm following. I've no time for 15 year olds in their mum's bedroom tweeting childish nonsense.
There are a huge number of people on there that care more about the amount of followers they have than the football club they claim to support.
It's full of c*nts.

[Pistolero]

It's very easy to avoid. So just do that.

[Fitzy.]

Is this where all the americanised shite comes from, do you think? Almost bordering on trash talk.

"The league ain't ready."
"Imagine thinking Player X is better than Player Y. There are levels to this game."
"Dead club"
"Ratio'd"

I find this stuff unbearable.

I guess blocking helps.

[Charlie Adams fried egg]

Twitter gets far too much attention for its size. It's a pretty small social media by usage now, not even top-10. Maybe 10% of the population uses it, but the journalists do and they are the superspreaders of nonsense.

Mainstream media needs to stop referencing "what Twitter is saying" as part of their broadcasts or articles.

I could maybe understand it years ago when it was a quick way to gauge public opinion, but fake accounts, trolling, bantz have made it useless as a way of getting an accurate sense check on anything.

So stop fucking doing it.

I must admit, if I watch or read anything that builds a piece around Twitter reaction, then that's my cue to leave.

[lamonti]

I seem to have a different Twitter experience to many.

Yes, it is full of idiots spouting shite, but you only see that if you actively look for it or make a decision to follow the idiots in the first place.

I follow something like 250 accounts, aside from people I know, mostly science/work, political pundits and some football-related accounts. So the timeline is managable and regularly provides interesting and thought provoking content. I'll occasionally click into threads depending on the tweet - if it's clear that it's full of shite, just click back straight away.

If you're always clicking on trending hashtags or the replies to every tweet by the LFC account, then what do you expect to see?

This also is completely the right way to do it. Don't follow anyone cos they're famous/notable/a celebrity.

The unfollow button, the mute button and at times, the block button are your friend. Also muting terms you don't want to hear.

The worst thing you can do is click on the name of a footballer that is trending* — it's a sewer of humanity in there.

*I say "trending" but in reality, it just tells you it's trending because it thinks you might want to read about it. It could be 1,000 tweets or it could 1.5m tweets and it says "trending".

[Fitzy.]

Great thread. Nice to see i'm not alone in switching on in time for kick off and ignoring all the "analysis" which is probably spoon fed to them anyway. I'm fairly confident that Souness is told by the Sky producers to slag Pogba off at any opportunity now that he gets attention for it on social media, same with Roy Keane being a general arsehole.

The eyes of the media must light up any time something dramatic happens, look at how many times Sky Sports mentioned the Pickford/Van Dijk incident afterwards. They do it because they know it guarantees them a discussion point and plenty of social media exposure. Same with commentary (Tyler & Neville are the worst for it), when something happens in a match they instantly start talking about either the narrative behind it or try to stir up some form of controversy. Take Salah's header against City a couple of years back, straight away Neville was on the "OOOOOOOH VAR WILL LOOK AT THIS OOOOOOH IS HE JUST OFFSIDE?!?!?!?!". There's no appreciation of the game by these clowns, just them grasping at any opportunity to provide a talking point. Or Arsenal Fan TV now overreacting to everything for the sake of "content".
 

The thing with that “VAR!!” shout after a goal is that you immediately distract from the brilliance. It’s so dull.

[jepovic]

I seem to have a different Twitter experience to many.

Yes, it is full of idiots spouting shite, but you only see that if you actively look for it or make a decision to follow the idiots in the first place.

I follow something like 250 accounts, aside from people I know, mostly science/work, political pundits and some football-related accounts. So the timeline is managable and regularly provides interesting and thought provoking content. I'll occasionally click into threads depending on the tweet - if it's clear that it's full of shite, just click back straight away.

If you're always clicking on trending hashtags or the replies to every tweet by the LFC account, then what do you expect to see?

I think the issue is that the archetypical twitter mentality, where fast and loud reactions are rewarded over insightful thoughts, is spreading like a cancer in mainstream media and politics. Everybody is affected by it, even if we don't use Twitter.

[Eeyore]

The thing with that “VAR!!” shout after a goal is that you immediately distract from the brilliance. It’s so dull.

To be fair though isn't that the fault of VAR and not the pundits. Even if you are in the ground you don't celebrate the same nowadays. Celebrations are somewhat stifled especially if it is a tight offside.

[Crosby Nick]

Is this where all the americanised shite comes from, do you think? Almost bordering on trash talk.

"The league ain't ready."
"Imagine thinking Player X is better than Player Y. There are levels to this game."
"Dead club"
"Ratio'd"

What I don’t get is that say the official Liverpool Twitter tweet something, at least half of the first ten or so replies will be “Finished club” or that awful contrived one that goes on forever about how they can’t support them anymore.

Which dickheads are doing this? And why?

Easy enough to ignore as you say, but still find it incredible.

[Dim Glas]

The thing is, it's always been there. Rashid has always been there. Corballyred has always been there. The Greek fella. He used to email people before there was twitter.

Wow, Rashid! What a blast from the past. What a nasty piece of work he was and I presume still is - luckily, haven’t bumped into him on twitter i don’t believe. And yep, a perfect example of how it has always been thus, just different, more widely used platforms for them to spit their bile from now.

But what irritates me about it though, is how main stream media give them a platform- using tweets in articles. BBC is one of the absolute worst for doing this. So that makes it far worse than it used to be when it was ‘just’ forums. Now their bile is spread far further.

[Barneylfc∗]

The worst kind of c*nt are those that film themselves at the game.

[lamonti]

I think the mainstream media uses twitter because:
1) it provides free content
2) it distances them from making outrageous pronouncements, while still amplifying and endorsing those outrageous pronouncements
3) it can be dressed as a force for good in the guise of a "democratising force"

In other words it's perfect to fill the space between your ads where you revenue comes in.

It's cheap, lazy and nasty.

[red1977]

The worst kind of c*nt are those that film themselves at the game.

Heres a picture of me, 10 minutes later, here are some pictures of me stood in my living room taking a picture of myself in the mirror. 10 minutes later, heres a picture of me in the bathroom mirror. 10 minutes later klopp out.