Who are you checking on X?

Are you still on Twitter? Wait. You're calling it X now, don't you? Anyways, if you want to remain sane, I’d say you may want to stay away from it as much as possible. You can’t? Okay, then, you can still be on X, but check only one or two accounts that you believe could make you smarter. Check their Timeline to find their new posts, and leave immediately after you’ve read all their posts. Why? Don’t ask me why. You know why, right?

Can’t you decide which accounts to follow? Okay. I can’t tell you which ones, but let me give you how you decide, sharing what I did in the past. Once upon a time, people used to write journals on the internet called blogs before switching to social media. There were so many blogs, but most of them were not worth reading for a large number of people. In those days, I kept checking one blog on a regular basis. A lot of people were probably reading the blog, but I am pretty sure they weren’t reading it like I did. I was not so interested in what he posted. I wanted to know what he was doing and how things changed as a result.

Who am I talking about? Guess. You might want to learn to find answers to questions yourself. Need some hints? All right—he has published so many books about an English language exam that is quite popular in Japan and South Korea. Not only does he know much about the test, but he has also held workshops for instructors who have preparation courses for the exam. I’d imagine you are like, “Aha! But why?” I could reply to the question with “Because.” I should be nice to you, though, so I can give you another hint: "It's because he has done more than that."

People’s values tend to be judged by the very superficial parts of their achievements. This applies to the guy we’re discussing. Most people simply consider his achievements to be what I mentioned above. If you are a real critical thinker, though, you should look beyond. Again, don’t expect me to give you answers—I wouldn’t. Anyways, I am not trying to check whether he’s currently doing. This could be because my interests have shifted from other people or because he has mostly finished the greatest parts of his original plans.

If you are smart enough, you will have to know that the guy I mentioned above is not who you should follow at the moment. In fact, there is no one who keeps shining forever. Let me tell you about another person I used to check out on Twitter. He was a political scientist who is good at describing what’s going on in the world using puppets. I liked to check his Timeline because I was so impressed with how he put limited numbers of words effectively on the platform. However, I don’t want to say anything too critical, but between you and me, I don’t think his account is worth following now. Not only this person, but a lot of people who used to look smart turned out to be mediocre or stupid. They may not have changed that much in the real world, and they might be doing a great job, but once they have gone off track online, they will not shine again.

So, can you find who to follow? Not yet? Seriously? Obviously, I can’t think of anybody but him if I am allowed to choose a person to follow on X now. I believe that most people with good eyes have already followed his account. However, they are not ready to give up checking other people’s accounts and focus on only his posts. Again, I strongly recommend you check what he writes and ignore anything else on X. I would not give you his name here, but I will give hints so that anybody can find out who I am talking about. He is a young researcher. He studied in the US for a few years and made fairly good achievements before coming back to Japan and starting working. Now you know who he is. Stop checking other people and read only his posts. More importantly, you should spend your time doing something else other than being on social media.