More tweets, less twaddle?

I'm just picking up here from a train of thought by Rich Baker over at his new site Conversational UK -- which he in turn picked up from the arch-tweeter @darren_bbc.  His point was about how, as your numbers within Twitter  grow, it's becoming less of a conversation and more of a broadcast shout.

Rich says in his post Feed Me, Twitter!

"Over recent weeks, I have been investing more time in unfollowing people I don’t have conversations with and seeking out new people to follow. My network is taking more and more maintenance to keep it relevant."

I'm struggling with the same issue.  I think trying to keep the number of those I follow below the 1,000 mark is reasonable.  I know myself that when I check out profiles of people who have followed me, if that person is following thousands I find it hard to believe that they are listening to any.  Or that my voice is valued at all.

Twitter is of course a time-leech. The more people you follow, the louder the distracting noise. And I do of course worry about all the tweets I'm missing.  So in a way, keeping the numbers that I follow down  is a relief (in the way that having less choice when shopping is a relief ).

To help the periodic Twitter-cull, there are two fab free gadgets which make it very easy: Twitter Karma shows when the love isn't mutual and you're wasting your time, which can be important (if hurtful) to know. * And then there's the the madly simple-to-use Twitcleaner which sorts the wheat from the chaff, finds the "time wasters, spammers, the boring, the bots" in those you follow. 

Also - I'm using Tweetdeck (though I hear that Hootsuite may be becoming the Twitter app de jour?) - and find it easy to make lots of columns of smallish groups of people whose Tweets I really don't want to miss.  Any lists you have created can also be viewed at a click in Tweetdeck also.

Does anyone else have any other Twitter coping strategies?

*A note on Twitter Karma.  @richard_baker alerted me to the fact that it isn't 100% accurate on the 'last updated' status of Tweeters (Thanks Rich).  I randomly checked a few and it was about 95% accurate - but I'd suggest you click thru and check before nixing someone only because Twitter karmna says they're inactive.