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The best solution to this problem is to minimise the number of social networks you use and the number of people you follow on them.

Of course, most people don't realise this until they're already suffering from the problem. When I had a Facebook account, I regularly "pruned" people from my friends list. Now I have a twitter account I try to minimise the number of people I follow, and the number of uninteresting posts I make.

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For the average internet user, the number of social networks they use and the number of people they follow is monotonically increasing. It's much easier to sign-up for something new than it is to delete your account. And it's much easier to add friends than it is to remove them. It's like asking people to get rid of every item in their house that they don't really need. It just requires too much work to sit and analyze someone and think, "Hmm, do I want to never hear from this person again on this network?"

I'm not sure that the best solution, it's just a solution.

Even interesting people have spammy days where they most too much (like at a conference) or stuff that's uninteresting to you. Permanently unfollowing is not a good solution to that.

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