Twitter Overview, Downloads and Widgets

I have heard all the craze about Twitter lately, but prior to this entry and researching it, I didn’t really known what it was or why it was getting so popular. I decided this has to be the next topic I dive into, learn about and share.

What is Twitter?
Social networking service that enables you to keep “hyper-connected” with your friends, family, co-workers, etc are currently doing. You can always know what your friends are currently doing.

Establishing My Account
Upon registering, one of the very first questions I was asked (even before I could set up my profile) is “what are you doing?” I later learned that this is the most important question with Twitter. You are always telling people what you are doing, thinking, etc.

I found that you can go to great lengths to update people who are following you. You can set up SMS, which is text messaging your site to update “what you are doing.” You also have the capability to receive updates via SMS. Twitter doesn’t charge for this service, but I’d watch the amount of texts if you are on a limited plan.

You can also setup a “nudge” (SMS Reminder) if you haven’t updated your Twitter in 24 hours.

The profile setup was very simple to complete. Now I’m ready to search for friends. You can search by “Name” or “Location.”

Viewing Profiles
Since I have a new account, I wanted to find a Twitter user who is well established and see what their page would look like. I think I found the perfect user. This user is following 1,999 users and being followed by 1,484. She’s given a total of 1,854 updates.

Upon accessing this user’s page, I had a few observations; the home page starts on the “Updates” tab of your page. The other tab is “Favorites.” “What are you doing” updates are at the top of the page and seem to serve as your page header. Directly beneath, your recent “updates” are displayed. You can type, text, etc to provide updates. This particular user just told us that “She doesn’t HEART sinus headaches” 7 minutes ago.

Your twitter page also displays the number of people you are “following,” ‘followed by” and the number of “updates.” You can click on each of these links to see the entire listing.

The other tab for the Twitter page is “Favorites.” When I clicked on favorites, I noticed really the only difference is the updates switched to what looks to be a “Top 5″ friends listing.

Now that I’ve seen an overview of how Twitter users update their page and provide updates to their followers, I wanted to look a littler deeper into Twitter.

I found a very helpful Twitter Blog, that’s definitely worth a look.

The downloads section of Twitter have a variety of downloads you can choose from.

Browser Specific Tools
Twitteroo (Internet Explorer) – Update your status from your PC. This tool enables you to update your Twitter status from your desktop, get Twitter notifications & sound notifications for new tweets, clickable links for your messages, you can view your friends timelines, etc.

Twitterific (MAC OS) – ($14.99) This application lets you read and publish “tweets.” It features a scrolling list of the latest “tweets” from your friends or the public listing. You can customize the way the list displays. You can also get this tool for your iPhone and iPod Touch.

Twitbin (Firefox) - This tool is a Firefox extension, which allows you send and receive twitter messages from your Firefox Browser.

Search Twitter
Twitter Search
Real-time Tweet Search

Tools & Widgets
Twitterfeed – Get an RSS or Atom Feed from your blog to Twitter.

Twittervision – This is a real-time geographic visualization of posts to Twitter. As new posts are made, it moves the map to that user’s post, showing the comment and their picture.

WidSets (Mobile) – (Free) Lets you update your friends over mobile by automatically sending updates each time you update your “What are you doing” section.

Opera Widgets (Opera Browser) – This is a page full of widgets specific to the Opera Browser.

Spaz (MAC, Windows, Linux) – (Free) Spaz is an open source desktop twitter client that has a very slick design. It allows you to send and receive tweets from your desktop.

Twitter Gadgets by Google – (Free) Lets you read and update your Twitter from your desktop.

Digsby – Digsby is a very unique widget. It is an IM Client that you can use to chatvwith all your friends on AIM, MSN, Yahoo, ICQ, Facebook, Google Talk, and Jabber with one simple to manage buddy list.

Digsby is also an email notification tool that alerts you of your new email. You can manage all your e-mail accounts from Digsby. It lets you delete, report spam, etc with just one click.

It can also be used for social networking. It can alert you of events like new messages and gives you a live Newsfeed of what your friends from Facebook, Myspace, Twitter and LinkedIn are up to.

In addition to these features, you can also add a Digsby Widget to your Blog. You can customize the colors, themes and size.

There are many more tools available, such as Blogo, Twhirl, and a large quantity of other Apps at Twitter Fan Twiki.

Twitter Tips
ProBlogger’s 35 Twitter Tips from 35 Twitter Users
Twitter Fan Twiki
How to use Twitter – Tips for Bloggers
25 Twitter Tips for College Students
Ultimate Twitter How To Guide & 100 Secrets

Do you currently use Twitter? What do you think the advantage of Twitter is? Do you have any widgets or tools that you currently use? As always, I’d love to hear from you.