What Is a Retweet or RT?

When you tweet on Twitter sometimes people like what you said so much (or just want to support you or even kiss up ) and so they create a new tweet by either clicking on Reply or Retweet.

Reply (found below the original tweet) automatically puts in the account name (starting with an @ sign) of the person who wrote the original tweet and lets you add whatever you want to say, copying as much or as little of the original tweet as you like. (Just so you know, some people take offense at their original tweet being edited, while others – like me – are just happy to be in there somewhere.) You can then tweet your new retweeted tweet, sometimes adding an RT (for retweet) plus a space before the person’s Twitter name to show they were the inspiration.

After you tweet it, you may get a “thx for the RT” or “RT thnx” or some such thing from the person whom you retweeted. (FYI: You can find people who RT you by clicking on your account name all the way to the right under Home. For instance, mine is @WorkCoachCafe which will show me all the people who retweet or RT my tweets.)

A person can also click on Retweet (found below the original tweet) and this will automatically RT the entire original tweet (exactly as written) to your followers, without your Twitter name  inserted. (You can’t find these in the @AccountName section, but you can find them by clicking on Retweets a few items down from Home, again all the way to the right.)

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NOTE: If you want to suggest changes to this or any other definition in our career dictionary, please feel free to add  your suggestions in a comment.