Twitteriffic!
I finally succumbed to peer pressure and set up an account on Twitter. Added the little Twitter widget to my sidebar, and have been playing with various tools for tweeting and consuming tweets. One I came across today is particularly interesting – TweetDeck. Its an Adobe AIR application. AIR is essentially a cross-platform delivery system for rich Flash applications that can work independently of a web browser. I’ve been seeing some very interesting applications of AIR recently. This one however is quite elegant indeed. I highly recommend it for anybody that is interested in tapping into Twitter.
Generally speaking, what intrigues me most is the dynamic that is created by mini-blogging sites. Twitter is one of many sites (even Facebook is trying to jump on the bandwagon with their latest redesign) using this paradigm. One of my favorite is Blip.fm – basically a mini-playlist site (if you want to apply the mini-blogging paradigm to this vertical). On Blip.fm (which by the way interfaces with Twitter quite nicely) you select music or link to publicly hosted mp3 files. Other people can then play your “mp3 mini-playlist” and give you props (a sort of social currency) for your selections, add you to their favorite DJs list, etc. Check out my blips if you’re interested.
Here’s an article comparing the top 4 mini-blog options. I haven’t comprehensively played with Jaiku or Tumblr, but the sites seem to be intriguing clones of the Twitter concept – according to a quick glance. Pownce seems to be have been acquired by SixApart and is no longer functional as its own site. Seems like there’s going to be some consolidation in this space, but I’m more interested in the apps being built around existing sites, like TweetDeck, and other verticals this can be applied to, like Blip.fm.
Anyone know any other cool examples in the mini-blogging space?
Tags: blip.fm, facebook, mini-blogging, twitter