A few years ago, the sci-fi author John Scalzi decided to write an explanation of how he uses Twitter, then pinned a tweet linking to that post to his profile so anybody thinking of following him could easily find it. That’s a good idea, so I am stealing it.

What I tweet about: I’ve often used the phrase “public notebook” to describe my tweets–in the sense that I share observations about the things I’m writing about as I learn them. Twitter remains highly useful for that, and for learning about various tech accomplishments and failures as other people report them.

I don’t just stick to tech, though. You will also find me rambling on about politics (writing freelance means I can ignore any stupid newsroom verdicts asking reporters to pretend they don’t think about the issues they cover), food, travel, gardening, space, sports (usually baseball), transportation, architecture, music, and parenting. Yes, there will be dad jokes.

Whom I follow: Most of the nearly 1,000 people I follow have some connection to the tech industry–they’re other tech journalists, analysts, policy advocates or industry executives. I also follow many politicians, in some cases because I think they have notable things to say about tech policy and other cases because I kind of have to (trust me, I’d rather not have Donald Trump’s rants in my timeline). Some companies are in my following list for customer-support purposes, and some friends are there because I like hearing from them. And in one case, I followed a reader by accident after fat-fingering the “follow” button, then decided to let that stand.

Why I might not follow you: While I’ve overcome my early snobbishness about cluttering my timeline with too many people, I’m still not going to follow somebody just because they ask. And “follow me back so I can DM you” is the worst kind of follow-me request. My e-mail address is in my bio for a reason, people!

I use the block button: I still don’t block people all that often, but if somebody is wasting my time with bad-faith arguments, I don’t owe them my attention. And tweeting nutcase conspiracy theories at me–about Seth Rich’s murder, to name the most common–will get you blocked almost immediately.

My DMs aren’t open: Direct messages can be useful as a replacement for text-message banter, but I don’t have my DMs open for everybody for the same reason I don’t invite the world to text me–I don’t need my life to be any more interrupt-driven. So if you were thinking of sending me a PR pitch via DM: My e-mail address is in my bio for a reason.

Retweets might be endorsements: Retweets always mean I want the original tweet to get a wider exposure, but that doesn’t mean I think highly of them. You can be sure that I hate a tweet if I share a screengrab of it to avoid accidentally popularizing that tweet or its author (and I wish more of you would do that instead of having Twitter’s algorithm think some idiot’s output deserves broader publicity). If, however, I retweet without adding any commentary, I probably do approve of that message.

Other notes: I’m frequently sarcastic, which can go over poorly in a medium that destroys context. I often live-tweet events like tech conferences, which can make my feed really busy. I have almost never done any live video on Twitter but probably should. And because I am a sci-fi nerd, my proudest moment on Twitter just might be getting retweeted by Mark Hamill.