mlsamuelson.com

When there are no rules, the second law of thermodynamics will come into play and the entropy of the system will increase. One way in which entropy increases is that, without any restrictions on communications among subsystems, communication will occur in an unrestricted way...

from Code Complete, 2nd ed. by Steve McConnell

The above statement pertains, in context, to software development, yet "Twitter" is what popped into my mind when I read it.

I've really gotten into Twitter of late, and noticed something of a maturing process in my expectations and usage of the service. I'm generally not a social network joiner by nature and temperament - though I am a professional web developer, and contribute some to open source projects - so perhaps this list may play differently for the more socially-driven individual. I think, however, there is some value in recording the incipient stages of this Twitterer's growth curve.

The stages: