How to create a one click follow list on Twitter

Follow fridays are a great idea. Its good to revitalise your following. However, there is a downside. Friday's twitter stream gets really clogged with #ff, and following each recommendation can be time consuming.

If I do follow a recommendation its usually one that's made personal; e.g. follow @thisperson because they're funny and post nude pics of themselves occassionally. That sort of thing. These personalisations are great, but they do take time to write. Plus, everybody I follow is fabulous in their own unique way. It never seems completely fair to recommend just a few people out of my whole twitter stream.

So here's what I'm trying now. A one click follow list.

And here's how I did it.

1. Trim your following. Cut out those who've fallen by the wayside.
I use http://friendorfollow.com to do this.

2. Create a list of everyone you follow on twitter.
Just click 'new list' which is on the right of your twitter stream. I created my list manually - it took 20 minutes or so for 200 people. I'm sure there'll be an automated way of doing this but I've not yet found it.

3. Create a one click follow list.
Go to http://tweepml.org/. In the box that says follow a twitter list just enter twitter username/list name or the url of the list (e.g. jonone100/everyoneifollow-11-12-09 or http://twitter.com/#/list/jonone100/everyoneifollow-11-12-09)

4. Create a link so people can follow with one click.
The link is just the list page on Tweepml. So the address for my list is http://tweepml.org/@jonone100/everyoneifollow-11-12-09. You can shorten this to make it easer to tweet. I use tinyurl, but there are loads of url shortners. This is the shortened url: http://tinyurl.com/y8lps3c

5. Add the shortened address to the list description (unfortunately, it won't be clickable).

6. Let people know.

So there you have it. I love the randomness of following people you don't know. My twitter stream has one bishop, several writers, musicians, some very naughty people, and lots of wonderful microbloggers. And Stephen Fry, of course.

I hope you get as much out of this way of doing things as I have. If you find quicker and easier ways to do this please let me know!