If you follow John Reese on Twitter or subscribe to his blog updates, you've probably seen the big hubbub over his recent email advising people to use Twitter.

I almost hate to link to these posts because they can be such a time sink when you start getting involved, but in case you haven't seen them, read these posts to get the story.

** Warning - DON'T let yourself get sucked into the discussion, no matter which side you agree with, unless you want to get yourself all worked up about something that really shouldn't have a direct bearing on you!

1. Pending Sign Of The Twitter Apocalypse: It's Being Talked About By Internet Marketers
2. Is Twitter Vulnerable To Marketer Attack?
3. Don't Spam Twitter Or You Will Die A Horrible Death

That last link goes to John Reese's follow up post to the original one he did yesterday. He seems to have realized his first response was based on emotion more than anything, so I figured I'd link to the newer one. If you really want to read his initial response, it's linked from his follow up.

So it seems the "web 2.0 community" (for lack of a better term) doesn't like the fact that one of their babies is starting to get used by direct marketers like John Reese.

It's hardly the first time - I've written about this a few times before.

Whether or not you believe Twitter is going to become a spammer's haven is really not the point here. After all, Twitter is an opt-in type system - you have to sign up to read someone's posts, and you can easily block them if they're spamming you.

The issue is what happens to these tools when thousands of people sign up on the recommendation of someone like John Reese, who markets to marketers.

In Twitter's case, aside from an increase in bandwidth, there's probably not that much downside even if thousands of people sign up and start making posts with little or no value. (Although with Twitter's track record for going down, that extra bandwidth could cause problems!)

But taking a wider view, when one of these resources gets "outed" by an internet marketer to their huge list, it inevitably gets inundated with crap, no matter how well meaning the marketer is who announced it.

They can tell people not to spam until they're blue in the face, but people will. A certain percentage of most internet marketing email lists are going to be people looking for a quick buck, who are willing to take whatever shortcuts they think are going to help them get it.

The people marketing to these marketers should realize that.

It's a tough road to travel. People like John Reese also help a lot of people find success marketing on the internet, so I'm not suggesting they shouldn't do what they're doing.

They just need to be aware that what they're doing is a bit of a double-edged sword, and the people who are using these resources in what they believe is a more "pure" way are probably going to take issue with the marketers who promote the system.

I avoided getting involved in the discussion yesterday for exactly the reason that it seems John Reese should have - it's too easy to get emotionally attached to your opinion and get all tied up in these arguments.

So what's the bottom line?

Don't spam (and I'll say it until I'm blue in the face)

When you hear about one of these tools from someone who's marketing to marketers, do a little research before jumping in.

See how people use it, become part of the community and learn how to fit in without offending people. See if you can find a way to integrate it into your internet business without trying to force your target market to change the way they do things.

Twitter is a good example. If you're selling to marketers or a tech-savvy market, you'll have plenty of your customers already using it, and those that aren't will be open to it.

If you're selling to people who are over 65 and not very computer savvy, chances are there's little value in being on Twitter.

Don't just blindly follow the latest technique from your favorite marketing "guru." Take the time to analyze whether or not you can use it effectively and if so, how.