In the world of social media, everything you do is everyone’s business. Everything you eat must be photographed and Instagramed (if you didn’t post a photo, did you really eat it?). If you saw and petted a puppy without posting about it to Facebook, did you really pet that puppy? Everything you do and everything you feel must be shared. So what happens when someone crosses you? That’s when the majority of us use our other trusted social platform, Twitter.

When we are born, we were all given various talents. Some of us mastered the art of painting while others of us mastered the art of cooking. But there’s a small handful of us that mastered the art of sub-tweeting. Managing to write about someone without directly addressing them in only 140 characters. So for all of you who are hazy of on the art of sub-tweeting, here’s a guidebook for it.

Step One: Understanding Subtweets

Subtweeting is a way to write about someone without directly mentioning them in only 140 characters. According to Google Trends, subtweeting picked up in 2010 – the same year that it was entered into Urban Dictionary. In 2012, people have been searching “define subtweet” and to this day, this search is still popular. So the mystery of subtweets is still being discovered today.

Step Two: Mastering the Double Language

You’ll need to master speaking in parallel directions. You need to find the even balance between saying what you mean and saying what you want everyone to see. You don’t want to lay too heavily in one direction, otherwise it might come across as petty and obnoxious. Instead, find a happy medium coating it so that it comes off as a clever tweet.

Step Three: Hail the Masters

There’s always room for improvement. Keep your eyes out for those who have mastered the art of subtweeting and learn from them.