Twitter: Social Networking?

Although it is called social networking, I somehow seem to be missing the true social aspect (this post refers to Twitter, but may also apply to other online services).

I’ve only been a Twitter member for a few weeks, but I already have formed a few preliminary opinions. Which admittedly may change over time?

Strangely there’s no ability for individuals to contact someone they are not being followed by, even though there is the easy ability to “block” any unwanted people. Yes, there is the @username feature, but get serious while there are many of us that do, there would also be many people who never bother checking that.

"Protected" postings; Okay, I don’t get it, these people might be better off using email (or perhaps the telephone)?

Many who don't follow anyone, even though they themselves post plenty of "Tweets", apparently expecting others to be interested enough to read what they have to say. Even though they appear obviously uninterested in what anybody else may be posting.

As opposed to the individuals appearing to, or at least wanting to give the impression that they follow tens or even hundreds of thousands of other people (Have you ever tried following a handful of fairly regular posters? Perhaps they are speed readers?)

The auto-follow-back function of some third party software, although seeming courteous, simply gives many spammers (using the term in a broad sense), also using automation the appearance of legitimacy (or popularity) by giving them an artificially inflated number of followers.

#hashtags, okay enough with the hashtags, there are so many it doesn’t even make any sense anymore.

Although there are many post which are interesting, amusing or even relevant (at least to some), many others are filled with seemingly endless inane babble. Which makes one wonder why the individual even takes the time to post it? (Okay, maybe many of us are a bit guilty of that, but you probably get my point.)

In fact in many ways it seems rather cliquish and anti-social, seeming to be more of a narcissistic broadcast medium than a social network (thus the possible proliferation of hoards of posers, spammers and celebrities (real and wannabe)).

Don't get me wrong, there are obviously many fine and sociable people using Twitter in a variety of useful ways; it's simply that the core functionality could be modified a bit to be a bit more social.

Agree or disagree?