SOFTWARE - SOCIAL NETWORKS - 14.04.2011

Live news via Twitter

Breaking new ground

The recent revolutions in the Arab world were at the same time “Twitter revolutions”. To follow such streams of Twitter messages live, a dedicated tool is indispensable. Here are the four most popular tools.

Tweetdeck

TweetDeck (http://www.tweetdeck.com) is an all-in-one dashboard for power users. Various columns give an overview of all your own tweets, including those from the people you follow, those which are meant for you or which retweet your tweets, etc. And after entering your Facebook, LinkedIn or Google Buzz details, you can also follow these social networks. It takes some time to get used to the numerous options of the tool, though. TweetDeck is a (sometimes slow) Adobe AIR application for Windows, Mac and Linux.

For Google Chrome there’s a TweetDeck web app (http://www.tweetdeck.com/chrome/) which runs in your browser.

Seesmic

Seesmic (http://seesmic.com) is a Silverlight application for Windows and Mac. It basically does the same as TweetDeck, but it looks more like a real Windows application. Seesmic is a more recent product and supports many more social networks. Separate plug-ins make it possible, for instance, to read posts from your Google Reader newsfeeds or (shortly) to find out who is bidding on the eBay objects you’re following. Besides, there’s the Seesmic Web, which you can use in any browser. Seesmic is slowly but surely gaining popularity over TweetDeck.

MetroTwit

MetroTwit (http://www.metrotwit.com - for Windows) has a lighter and better organised interface than TweetDeck or Seesmic. It’s much faster, too, but for the moment you can only monitor your Twitter account. For as long as it’s in the beta version, MetroTwit will remain free.

HootSuite

If you prefer working completely from within your browser, check out HootSuite (http://hootsuite.com). It works in exactly the same way as all other Twitter clients, with columns sub-divided into tabs for each social network (Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, etc.). The advantage of this Twitter client is that it allows you to schedule tweets (in other words, send the same tweet several times at the times you set); it also provides detailed statistics about who is reading your tweets and who retweets you and it can save tweet queries. Finally, there’s a book­marklet for your browser tool­bar so that you can instantly start tweeting about the webpage you’re currently visiting.

Mobile

Needless to say that twittering is only really useful when you can do it everywhere. The most interesting innovations can therefore be found in the field of Twitter clients for devices such as iPhone, iPad, or Android smartphones and tablets. Apart from the official Twitter ­client by Twitter itself (now with annoying ads), the charging Twitterrific is highly popular for the iPhone and iPad. For Android, the free Twicca and Plume are good alternatives. Or you can simply choose TweetDeck, Seesmic or HootSuite, as they are all available for these devices, too.