But at that point I'm not sure we're not looking at a heuristic anymore – we're looking at building a system designed to measure the authenticity, popularity, sincerity, or actual importance of an individual in a social network. Which is probably a big part of describing consumer behavior on social media (think of all the Gladwell-esque articles to be written).

And you are right, despite commercial “misuses” (i.e. companies that are on twitter just to be on twitter…and they make no valuable content contribution), there are definitely interesting conversations going on, mostly between consumers . The challenge right now is how do we track and aggregate such information so that we can describe consumer behavior in terms more specific than “WOM is happening” or “people are talking about xyz”

i still think you should look into my recommendation regarding atlanta

Many of the users I quoted are internet celebrities, and like movie stars the average individual wants to be close to them, something that can be accomplished through the follow button. There's also the chance to see inside an organization you don't have access too, which is part of why I follow Twitter's founders. Or the opportunity to learn from people you respect. Or to see what content they can find on the web (Guy Kawasaki).

Twitter, like Facebook, can have its serious applications for both professional marketing and personal relationship building. And it certainly has its uses for link sharing and real time trending internet nonsense. Yes, I would agree that a good portion of the Twitter community is marketers, and chances are they're marketing their products to other marketers. But there are also some serious conversations going on. And that's worth looking into.