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Showing posts with label twitter. Show all posts
Showing posts with label twitter. Show all posts

Sunday, 17 August 2014

Ghanaian Trolls, Almost All You Need to Know

Trolling is an art and I don't mean to brag but i'm good at it. I was trolling long before trolling was cool. Social media just gave me the platform to take my talent to places that hitherto I couldn't. Back in the old days, trolling was considered a noble art and us trolls had a lot of respect. These days, the profession is full of glory hunters who have no respect for the etiquettes of the job. The rise of these glory hunters has led to a sort of uprising from the trolled.

If you have to use profanities or insulting words then trolling is not your calling. If you have to think too long for a witty come back, trolling is not for you too. True troll’s stings are instant and comes from using their targets words or mistake against them. In a way a troll is a predator lurking somewhere near by just waiting to pounce.

Most of best Ghanaian trolls reside on twitter. It's amazing how much sting one can fit into 140 characters or less.


Meme Makers
@Qwestmatic and @Mike_Nkansah were meme lords extraordinaire long before the "abrokyire" memes, vines and GIFs flooded the local meme industry. Like the cheap imported Chinese fabrics that have virtually collapsed the local textile industry, these foreign memes have threatened to kill the local meme-generating sector. These two, in addition to the new-age cohort of meme-generators have, however, held their own by providing Gh Twitter with all-purpose as well as specific memes.

Long before I knew they were called memes, @QwestMatic was making them. Qwest is the Rumpelstiltskin of memes. He turns innocent looking pictures into hilarious memes. He'll make you famous for reasons you might not be too pleased about. His meme are not generic memes of people who live far off in other countries.  They are of people well known on Gh twitter. By crudely photoshopping regular pictures, he’s able to caricature even the most respectable people and turn them into laughing stocks. He introduced us to twitter story telling an art which has become popular especially after any twitter organized event or controversy.
The secret to being a renowned meme legend probably lies in having a huge meme arsenal or the ability to generate one within a time that the tweet it is in response to is still viable. These trolls can even fit a meme to your harmless "Good morning" tweet and invite "strangers" into your mentions with their [insert laughing and crying emoji].

Meme generation is a high level specialist troll group which requires the actors in this group to identify and highlight the funny undertones in supposedly ordinary everyday photos like Twitter event shots and your Facebook "blasts-from-the-past" photos. A picture says a thousand words, but a picture with words say a thousand and one words; that is how influential these troll memes can be.

 Sports Trolls:
Meet @Stayne_ a Manchester United fan who lives to torment Liverpool Fans, Arsenal fans and any other fan that dares to usurp his dear club's throne. This fellow takes more pleasure in seeing rival teams lose than seeing his own team win.  In the 2013/2014 Premier League season, Man U led by David Moyes were having a terrible season and Liverpool looked all set to win the league. For Stayne, the thought of Liverpool winning the league hurt far more than his team at seventh place. Liverpool somehow managed to throw away their lead thanks to a slip by their captain and talisman Stevie Gerrard.

The misery of Liverpool fans nourished him. He took great joy in reminding Liverpool fans how Man U castaways like Bebe, Don Fangzhuo and the likes had more premier league medals than their great captain. 
His account was recently suspended for five days after Liverpool fans worldwide reported him as spam. After the account was unblocked, he continued where he left off, unrepentant. He' is like a plague, sent by the gods of football to torment everyone else. 

Snake Under Grass:
They look like mild mannered tweeps until they are not. Their Clark Kent to Superman transformation always catches you by surprised. Meet @Quasiadu, snake under grass troll numero uno. He's the puppet master behind the Against Supporters Union (ASU).  He and his legion of trolls only exist to cheer whichever team is playing against your favorite team. The 2013/2014 EPL season was filled with glory days thanks to David Moyes and Stevie Gerrard. Jose Mourinho going trophiless was an extra bonus.

The Snake Under Grass' favorite victims are other sports trolls. Members of ASU were constantly pitching camp in Stayne's mentions.

@Quasiadu and @Stayne_ achieved international notoriety during the London Olympic games when Nigeria played against the USA in basketball. Their constant trolling of the Nigerian team's abysmal performance didn't sit too well with Nigeria twitter. This led to a fully fledged war between Gh and 9ja twitter. At the peak of the hostilities, these two left the battlefield for some high ground so they could admire the chaos. Nero, watching as Rome burned.

Grammar Nazis:
That’s what everyone calls them, probably because they want to purge the world of all bad grammar users. These groups of trolls are mainly opportunistic hunters. They mind their own business till someone makes a spelling mistake or grammatical error then they pounce. There used to be accounts that were solely dedicated to this form of trolling but they seem to have faded away. Grammar Nazis are probably the most tolerated kind of troll, that is until you are the one being trolled.
I’ve noticed that the quality of English written on twitter has improved a lot late. Either the trolls have scared people into writing proper English or they driven the bad nuts away. Once in a while though, you still find someone writing something so terrible, you can’t help trolling no matter who you are.

Once in a while, someone types some gibberish that even the Grammar Nazis refuse to touch.

Religious Trolls:
Religious trolls fall into two categories, Atheists and Christians. For some reason people of other religions don't seem to troll as much and Atheists seem more interested in hounding Christians.
The Christian troll's favorite word is “Blasphemy”. They can't take a joke. They appear uninvited in conversations that have nothing to do with them and start asking you to repent. These are not your regular Everybody-is-Holy-on-Sunday-Christians. When they are not hounding everyone else with random Bible verses, they are tweeting things like, “The sun doesn’t shine at night so retweet if you love Jesus”.


All atheists on twitter seem to know each other and the moment one of them enters your mentions, there rest follow and pitch camp. I really don’t get the Christian versus Atheist debate. The Christians won’t be convinced there is no God and the atheists won’t be convinced there is.

In the end, they are more alike than they like to admit. They are all trying to shove their opinions down your throat.  

Technically there’s a third group. The confused ones. They are on the atheist bandwagon because they think it’s cool but don’t understand the basic principles. Funny thing is they are more aggressive than the true atheist and are always in an argument with someone and contradicting themselves. You have to admire their misguided determination.
Bloggers and Mixtapers:
Technically these guys should be considered as spammers but let’s just call them trolls. The only difference between Bloggers and Mixtapers is that you probably follow the Blogger and have no idea how the Mixtaper appeared in your mentions. Mixtapers are among the most slandered people on Gh twitter but they have tough skins and don’t really mind the abuse.

Annoying People and Parody Accounts:
This account, @SkuBoye, is rated 18, NSFW and generally anything that children shouldn’t be looking at. He account was suspended but he came back with another and just continued being annoying. His over the top trolling of has led to some really epic responses from some Ghanaian celebrities.
Jon Germain's respond to SkuBoye's tweet led to the hashtag #JonGermainCanFind

@pweedyella is not as X-rated as @SkuBoye but no less annoying. I’m not sure if the person behind the account is a he or a she but the person definitely has no sense of moderation when it comes to trolling.

@YesiYesiGhana:
As far as I know this is the only spoof site in Ghana.  They take serious topics and turn them into jokes. In a country where serious topics are a joke anyway, this account isn’t running out of topics anytime soon. It’s always interesting when people take a story from YesiYesi seriously. Very often, news sites will take a story from this spoof account seriously and repost it as news. Your favorite Ghanaian politician or celebrity has probably been ridiculed by YesiYesi more than once. 

Do Not Feed the Trolls:
Do not fight with trolls unless you can knock them out. People might not be paying attention to what is going on but will drop everything to come watch a fight. They might not agree with what the troll is saying but will immediately gang up on you if you get abusive.

However, if you manage to give the troll a good punch they will carry you shoulder high and then turn on the troll. Twitter folks are fickle. They are just here for the thrill. Whoever is providing it gets their support regardless of who is right or wrong.
@NiiLexis spent a lot of time trolling Guinness until one day this happened...
Unfortunately, the Guinness Ghana account was closed down not long after but they definitely gained the respect of Gh twitter folks after that epic comeback.

@Kwakutii: 
By popular request I'm adding this guy, sigh. I really want to say something nice or funny about this guy but I keep drawing blanks. There are annoying people, there are arseholes and then there is @Kwakutii. From all indications he's an intelligent guy but as someone said, he doesn't have 'Efie Nyansa' (wisdom). His insensitivity, ridiculously entrenched positions and know-it-all attitude rapidly earned him infamy on Gh twitter. This guy just gave trolls a bad name.

This guy was was the most blocked person on Gh twitter. From celebs to sports men and even people who knew him personally, everyone was blocking him. I'm not sure why I followed him for so long but I finally had to block him after he made some insensitive remarks to a friend about a family member she had lost less than 24 hours earlier. His account is no longer active on twitter, I don't know if twitter suspended his account or what but i'm not too perturbed.

Hasta la vista @Kwakutii, you won't be missed

Don’t bother explaining. Twitter folks don’t care. Sarkodie’s Irish cream line at on BET Chypher was a trolls delight and Sarkodie’s attempt to explain it led to more trolling than he expected.

 Follow these accounts if you are brave enough but don't say i didn't warn you.


Any other kind of troll i forgot about? Leave that as a comment


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Wednesday, 26 March 2014

Gh Social Media; the Good Samaritan

Yesterday, March 25, 2014, I read the story of Isaac Coffie a young man who graduate from Senior High School with seven A1s and one B3 and yet couldn't make it into any tertiary institution for financial reasons.

I posted the story on twitter and Facebook and got quite a lot of feedback from people who wanted to do something. In the beginning, the idea was to raise funds enough to get him into school and probably establish a scholarship fund or something of the sort.

 I contacted some friends on how we could do this and started raising awareness. The result was amazing. In the end we didn't have to donate any money. Hopefully, next time clarion call, we will get an even bigger response and people will still be willing to donate.

There were lots of messages I can't share because they were in my inbox and DM. Here is how it went.


Post by Efo Dela.


Post by Efo Dela.


Post by Ashesi University.


Post by Efo Dela.


Post by Efo Dela.

Post by Efo Dela.






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Monday, 17 February 2014

How To Be A Cool Kid On Ghanaian Twitter

My first time featuring a Guest Blogger, for now only known as "Regular Champion". Please enjoy.

Everything said on Ghanaian twitter is the gospel. Even the hordes of heaven read it. This is why Ghanaian twitter is the law. It's the best twitter in the world. And that is not even up for debate or discussion.
But there are cliques on there. Something about an Estates Ghanaian twitter and Zongo Ghanaian twitter.  How does one identify them? See….

Estate twitter, make some noise….. “Hello!!!!”
Zongo twitter, yɛ dede yɛ dede…… “Yay yay yay!!!”

You see, there are levels to this shiiiiiiid….

Which leaves us here at the issue of cool kids. Really, who are they? What do they look like? Do they get someone to flush the toilet for them when they "shank"? Do they dictate their tweets for people to type and tweet for them? They are a mystery.

But I'd help you know who they are and how to become one, which is the exact reason you're reading this blog. You won't admit it but yeah....

But first....

"This blog post is a work of fiction. All characters in it are fictitious. Any resemblance to actual events or locales or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental."

So really, hope for your sanity and health's sake that you don't take anything said here seriously. Then again, you'd be kidding yourself. You also want to be a cool kid too or want to find out if what you do on Twitter makes one. If not, you wouldn't have bothered reading this blog post... You want to close the page now, but you can't because you're interested.

Pay attention. Stop all other things you're doing and pay attention. The revolution is here. This is what you must do to be a cool kid on Ghanaian twitter....

1. Follow the rich kids.
They say to be a star; you have to be friends with the stars. These "twitter celebs", errrm, sorry.... cool kids are friends with each other. They have a clique. You see eh, you have to do "ahushishɛ" to sit on the cool kid table.
Here's how to get in...

I. Have a cool handle.  You can't be a cool kid if you have a handle like "@trumukingkong", "@nunguadongbortey", "@tw3kelewele" and those abonkele handles. Present yourself with a smart handle.

II. For the life of Jesus, never ask for a followback. The cool kids hate that. They would ignore you like the first slice of bread. All the Israelites in Egypt followed Moses but the essential question is, did he follow back? Don't be vain...

E.g  “@BarimaPages: @JunkieOnMars are u gonna follow back or not?"

III. Don't you ever over "loooooooool" their tweets. They won't even bother following you. Plenty "o's" in your "lol", do you lack home training?

IV. Add the "---->" or "!!!" on a cool kid's tweet. You‘d create the impression that you’re smart and that you have cool kid potential. Small small, they will start accepting you.

E.g   ----> ‘’@The1TheyCall_E: Man... No children's book writer was fucking with R.L. Stine in the 90s." or 
!!! "@pay_drama: Easily top 5 baddest action movie over past 30 years. "@temposkillz: Terminator 2 is still badass””
 ----> "@niilexis: It would be great disservice to mankind if Harvey Specter & Mike Ross don't do a choreographed azonto dance in one episode of Suits."

----> RT @NiiLexis: Bruh!



2. Let your tweets have an appealing appearance.

I. Tweet about foreign musicians and actors. You can't be tweeting about Akrobeto [with his nose like he's breathing for all the people in his village] and Kweku Manu and expect the cool kids to follow you or for people to recognize you as one. These "twitter celebs" [maybe we should just accept that this is what they are... maybe not.. you decide] will respect your opinion if you tweet about foreign movies and songs. And tweet about every cast member of all popular TV series.

E.g   "@paakoti: Can't wait! "@SeanReezy25: RoboCop Official Trailer #1 (2014) - Samuel L. Jackon, Gary Oldman Movie"". You see how the cool kids aren't tweeting about Kyiewaa Part 1 to 35 or Mahama Akonfem Part ooooooone and twooooooooo!?

II. Find an expensive hotel/restaurant and tweet that you're eating breafast/lunch there and add the location. The cool kids won't even bother following you if tweet that you're eating at Aisha Maame Waakye or "Didi na forgeti Suarez" chop bar.

E.g "@freddiePBS: Saturday morning , brief basing @ Golden Tulip Hotel,Kumasi." and "@pay_drama: Twist doin Moet Rose for 350 ghc and come to find out the bar at Movenpick doin Veuve Clicquot Rose for 200 ghc. Can u imagine? Smh"

Once you do this, you'll start getting groupies. Go to church and give a testimony, pop champagne, throw a buffet, etc. You have arrived. Now you are a cool kid and shiiiid. Before you know it, people will start following you and be asking for follow back and shiiid.


3. Create a blog account.

Start writing. About anything at all you can think of. Movies, relationships, music, sports, comedy, even the stock exchange market....... But wait! This is not an option for anybody. Some of you can't write so don't even bother with this option. Some of you too have blogs that are running already. Please close it. Your parents are working night shifts and weekends and paying expensive school fees and you're there writing like you never attended primary school.  Stop destroying their efforts at making you a cultured person. You think I'm subbing, but I'm really not. I'm just stating the obvious, but pay me no mind... let me continue, chale.

Now to "you niggas" [that's a cool kid phrase, learn to use it worhor] who can write... start that blog now. Throw in a few "big words". But really, your cool kid status depends on how many figures of speech you can bash around. Throw some damn metaphors in there and make yourself look like you're some J.K Rawlings [Yeah, you can tweet that you read her books. Spell it exactly like you see it here too]

You won't just be a cool kid with this. You might actually get some beeetches dm'ing you after about your third blog post. [Desperately hoping that'll be the case for me when this goes up too]. Thank me later. But you can always give me the back pass after this has worked perfectly well for you. I never go bore!


4. Put up a good-looking picture.

If you know you're not fine, abeg you in the name of Jesus, please don't use your picture as your avatar or twitcon [that's what the cool kids say]. If you dare put up a picture of yourself and you look like the demon monkeys in Temple Run, these cool kids will slander you till you deactivate your account. They own Ghanaian twitter. It is for their mothers and fathers. So if you have a large upper body and very tiny legs which leave you looking like a half-empty toothpaste, here's free advice: Google a cute baby's picture and use as your picture. Or visit your auntie who has a beautiful baby and use their picture. Or use a group picture where people can't match your tweets with your hideous face.

Best case scenario: Photoshop some Loius Vitton belt/handbag/sunglasses unto your picture. Or use a good filter that hides your face. Make your eczema and tribal marks look like tattoos.


5. Tweet about foreign sports.
You can't tweet about Dong Bortey or Aminu Dramani and expect to earn cool kid status. You're doing the whole twitter thing wrong then. You also can't possibly be tweeting about "chaskele" and "zanzama". Have some self-respect. Tweet about F1 and tennis. Google all the stats about Roger Federer and tweet them. Heck, even tweet about golf and cricket.


6. Use acceptable twitter clients for cool kids:
You're using Snaptu and Mobile Web and you want to be a cool kid? Saagaa. Twitter for iPhone, Mac and iPad gives you a good chance of becoming a cool kid. If you tweet via Andriod, we can't be sure if you're using a "cool kid phone", you know, like the Samsung Galaxy series or anything like that. Once in a while, tweet about your phone having issues so people will know the phone you use.


7. Tweet about smoking, drinking and getting all the twitter hunnies. Also be insomniac.
If you want your cool kid-ness confirmed, please tweet about being at a shisha lounge. Or you’re at an expensive pub drinking some top-dollar wine. Or have insomnia. It is never cool to sleep. What in hell's name are you sleeping for? It is cool to tweet at night. Fight every single urge to sleep. Drink coffee, chew "prekese" or buy any energy drink your see on the market to stay awake. You do this and your cool kid status is about to be confirmed.

#TeamShisha and #TeamInsomnia, beeetches!


8. Tweet about non-existent stuff like music or movies nobody has heard off.

These cool kids know about most things already. Didn't I tell you twitter is for their father? There isn't a song they haven't heard before or a movie they haven't watched before. Well, they don't know much about the latest songs from Amakye Dede and TH4Kwaagees and they probably haven't seen the latest "fanta-face, kaka-kola body" Yvonne Nelson movie. No wait... Really, is she the one who when she acts actually prefers to be paid in bleaching cream, weaves, eye liners & lip gloss than actual money? *bleep* No, I was hacked there... Let's move on. 

These cool kids will be baffled when they see you tweet about something they don't know. 

E.g Jack Willian Parkinson is such a great actor.

Boom! You'll see them in your mentions like the Israelites who wanted to be first to cross the Red Sea. These cool kids are curious, so make hay there.

I know there are people who are probably saying at this point that twitter is not a big deal. But they still have twitter accounts. #SkinpainTwitter. They are not cool kids so they have bore. Don't mind them.
Follow these rules and become a cool kid.



by: Regular Champion
"I'm in pursuit of a cool kid status. Mentioning my handle here means you would never acknowledge me as one."

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Monday, 13 January 2014

African Nations In High School ( #AfricanNationsInHighSchool )

On Sunday January 12, 2014, @SiyandaWrites on twitter started the #AfricanNationsInHighSchool which quickly caught on. Africans everywhere (including yours truly) joined in with some witty tweets. Here is a collection of some of them.




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Wednesday, 21 August 2013

Signs of the End Times (Funny Church Signs from Africa)



It's either the modern African Christian scares the devil or causes him to laugh hysterically. I'm not sure which it is but here are some pictures to help you decide.

If we are in the 'End Times', then these are literally the signs

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Location: Accra, Ghana

Thursday, 20 December 2012

Ghanaian History

On 19th December I along with a few friends started the #GhanaianHistory twitter trend. Here are some of the really hilarious tweets.

These tweets are embedded so feel free to retweet or follow their owner.
Join the fun, leave a comment





































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