How Twitter replies *acutally work*. With proof.

gistfile1.md

<+elliottcable> fotoverite ⁓ Basically, there’s two situations in which a tweet from @A will not show up to
                person @C, who follows @A
<+elliottcable> 1. if the tweet *starts* with an @ character as the very first character, followed by at
                least one legal username character
<+elliottcable> 2. if the tweet is marked as a “reply̦” to another tweet, with the in_reply_to_status_id
                property
<+elliottcable> now, neither of the above apply *if* @A is *also* following the third person, @B (for
                instance, if the tweet *started* with @B, or if the in_reply_to_status_id was a tweet by @B.)
<+elliottcable> That is the *entirety of how it works*.
<+elliottcable> It’s a very long-standing belief that if you stick something before the @ at the start of a
                tweet after clicking reply, it will make it *no longer a reply*.
<+elliottcable> This is not true.
<+elliottcable> It still has an in_reply_to_status_id set, and it still WILL NOT SHOW UP to people not
                following the person you’re replying to, but whom follow *you*!
< mordof> elliottcable: have you tested that out before?
<+elliottcable> If you truely want to mangle the conversation-chain and annoying your followers, you need to
                *manually create a new tweet from scratch* (not clicking reply!), and *type the name out* (or
                copy-paste it in, or tab-complete it … whatever you use in your client.)
<+elliottcable> That is how you create a tweet without an in_reply_to_status_id.
<+elliottcable> Of course, you still have to avoid starting it with an @ symbol, which means doing .@this
                (or, if you have half a fucking ounce of style and taste, you’ll re-word the tweet to fit the
                @name in the middle instead.)
<+elliottcable> mordof ⁓ yes, multiple times. It’s been that way since day one; it’s never changed, that has
                *always* been a myth.

yeah the 'get a new account' portion -1

@polotek, @csanz: Not disagreeing that it sucks, but we’re stuck with it. I was one of the most outspoken advocates of reverting the Reply Nerf of 2009, way-back-when; it became obvious that @twitter has no plans to do anything whatsoever about this. They like-and-want it this way.

Given that we’re stuck with it, an extra account (which most clients make trivially easy to manage) for holding (and then retweeting-from-your-main-account) conversations is the best solution for all involved.