We've missed you on Twitter! - jonbounds@gmail.com - Gmail

It’s easy to sign up for a Twitter account, all you need is an email address. It used to be even easier, they weren’t even verified. I have, I estimate, about a hundred—lots used but others created for short-term projects or jokes. Some, in truth, in the same way as you register a domain name—idea half-formed but name assured.

That it was so, lead to a lot of great Twitter names claimed but unused and unloved. (@fry posted to about once very 6 months, @cat about the same)

Unless it violates a trademark, there’s no real mechanism for getting one freed up either.

Twitter has about the same sign-up to action ratio as most social web sites, but unlike Facebook for example your username, its uniqueness, its readability, matters. And those are getting used up too cheaply.

So, the first stage I think—the “where are you” email above, which I ‘ve just received. A shot that says ‘we did warn you’, when six months later—if you don’t log in— the account is closed and the name freed

How do I tell them that directing Twitpantos is a very, erm, seasonal activity?

If you’ve an account that you value, I’d take time to post every so often.

Is Twitter about to do a mass reclaim of unused accounts?