Kitty Twitter

Is it just me or are there quite a lot of Avatar pictures on Twitter with cats on them?
According to my own research, 1 out of 10 cats owners who are on Twitter, let their cat go on Twitter. Either that or their cat is using their account without permission. What are these cats up to?

My suspicion was aroused by just looking through my timeline and seeing many cats. Out of my 550ish followers, the following have cat pictures.

@Ita99
@pussinabox
@raubrey
@themabe
@anniesten
@ourmissingcat (although this may be a plea)
@zymeth120
@beecheese (real life friend I know has 2 cats - who look a bit suspicious)

That equates to 1.5% of my followers and if you include users who have the word cat in their name, who I suspect may be cats, (@helcatwill, @Catherinelm and @clarkycat) the cat rate goes up to 2%.

Assuming I am not attracting cat followers for some reason and that means that 1.5% to 2% of Twitter users are cats. You cannot fault the science here.

The science bit
There are 9 million domestic cats living in the UK and something like 84 million in USA.
This means 0.15 cats per person in UK and 0.27 in USA. But cats are intelligent and their attitude is that they are not a pet. Cat's think they actually 'own' their humans and care for them by letting their human stroke them (but only if the cat is the right mood and their human has been good - it might as likely be a scratch to keep the human on their toes).

Therefore it is more appropriate to say that there are about 7 humans for each cat in UK and only 3.5 humans for each cat in USA - so US cats have less humans to look after and therefore more time on their hands (paws) for Tweeting.

This is surely the main explanation for the higher level of Twitter users in the USA than the UK - it is all driven by cats! One can only assume that the recent increase in Brazilian Twitter accounts has been driven by wild ferrell cats somehow accessing the technology (most likely through mobile devices).

To back up my research, I looked through the first 100 tweets I saw on the public timeline to see how many avatars were cats and... well there weren't any. But the cats clearly knew I was going to be looking because I had Tweeted my intentions earlier today - They know I am onto them.

Some of these cats are quite clever too and put pictures of their humans on the Avatar. Perhaps the cats are too ugly to go on the Avatar themselves, but most likely they are trying to hide their plot to take over Twitter.

Finally my research has determined that, where Twitter users have a cat, those cats are accessing the Twitter account (14% in the UK and 7% in the USA).




So why are there so many cats on Twitter?

One suggestion by experts such as @dawniepants is Food. There is the obvious attraction of the birds - all this talk of Tweeting and the Twit Bird must get cats licking their lips in that sinister way (in my 100 sample, although there were no cats there were about 5 birds).

@dawniepants also suggests the Fail Whale, which the rest of us lament, could send cats crazy with excitment and I suggest this could also explain their co-ordinated efford to flood the system.

Another theory is the owners are involved.
In an article By Franny Syufy on About.com, One of the 'Top Mistakes by New Cat Owners' is 'Not allowing a cat to be a cat'. I think letting your cat go on Twitter is breaking this rule and owners would be well advised to give it a read.

A related theory is that Twitter simply attracts people who like cats.
Cats suit intelligent people (see this article in the Telegraph 'Cat owners more intelligent than dog owners' - and I am pointing this out as a dog owner myself). Correspondingly Twitter users are on average more intelligent than non-Twitter users (no twits you might say!).

Cats suit people who do not have time to look after more dependent animals such as dogs. Of course Twitter suits busy people too - the 140 character fast and free format fits with this image - especially with mobile devices that allow you to Tweet while picking up your cat food (e.g. 'Just picking up cat food - lol xx').

Cats are more likely to be owned by single people (anecdotally - this is why WalMart put the cat food near the Wine). And if you're on Twitter a lot and you're not single, you soon will be unless you can get your partner on too.

So Twitter and Cats go hand in hand.

What can we do about it?
Just in case this is not just a bit of fun by the cats and/or their owners I think we need to keep an eye on them. If you suspect that one of your followers is a cat - Tweet on #Ivespottedacat tag and use these questions to try to flush them out.

a) Do you like fish?
b) Do you like purring?
c) Are you actually a cat?

That is the best I can do for you - if in doubt, get the hell out. Don't encourage them.