Ah, Twitter – What a magical thing! Back in the day, you had to slip a note to the person in front of you while Mrs. Manchester wasn’t looking. Now, thanks to a cell phone, you can share way, way too much personal information with complete strangers on the Internet. (And we thank you for it!)

Here are some frequently asked questions about Narragansett Patch and its Twitter account. Have something else you’d like to see answered? Send an e-mail to Local Editor Stephen Greenwell at the conveniently-spelled address of Stephen.greenwell@patch.com.

Q: Why the heck are you following me anyway?

A: Typically, there are several reasons why. 1) You live or work or own a business in Narragansett. 2) You’re an alum or current student of Narragansett High School, the Prout School or the University of Rhode Island. 3) You have a bunch of friends in either #1 or #2, and thus they RT or mention you frequently, leading me to follow you. 4) You are a Rhode Island organization. 5) I just enjoy following you. (Hi there Old Hoss Radbourn and Very Fake Al Davis.)

Q: Hey, I fit into those groups! Why aren’t you following ME?

A: Most likely, because your account is private. Our policy for private accounts is that we only send a follow request if you follow us first. Failing that, we also generally don’t follow people who just tweet nothing but links or nonsense, and we also don’t follow pornographic Twitter accounts.

Q: What will you use my tweets for?

A: Generally, we use Twitter just to see what’s going on. It can be an incredibly valuable source – It was with Twitter that we found out about a bank robbery in Bonnet Shore. Sometimes, we do some light crowd sourcing, such as for our graduation coverage or getting reaction to the death of Osama. When we do take from Twitter in this fashion, it is normally very innocuous stuff.