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How We Tweet: The Definitive List of the Top Twitter Clients

readwriteweb.com — Twitter has one of the fastest growing application ecosystems of any web service outside of Facebook. For this post, we looked at 37,248 tweets and found 142 different ways in which people interact with the Twitter service. Some of the results, which follow below, were rather surprising.

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  • domfosnz, on 04/03/2008, -8/+10Timely. Just started twittering and am looking for a twitter client comparison.
    • Angostura, on 04/03/2008, -8/+19Tell me! TELL ME! Are you changing your socks? About to pick up a book? Looking out of the window? A waiting public needs to know.
    • Hangly, on 04/04/2008, -0/+2I don't believe you.
  • ipek, on 04/03/2008, -6/+19twhirl FTW!
  • dmcorp, on 04/03/2008, -6/+4Via web or on the Twitter site is ok, but it doesn't auto update the stream, you have to refresh. Via phone is ok if you have 10 thumbs, but do check your provider, as you may be charged by the message.

    I tested two clients over a period of days. Twitterific worked well for the most part, but was prone to frequent errors in the data stream. The feature set is also quite limited.

    My favorite at the moment is Twhirl. It has a nice feature set. Lots of configuration options and doesn't have the ads and errors like Twitterific.

    So final answer, Twhirl is the clear winner of the ones that I've tested so far.
  • Spuby, on 04/03/2008, -9/+15i bet a statistic regarding the age of people using twitter would reveal most are under 18 (physically, mentally,...)
    • turoczy, on 04/03/2008, -9/+2I'll take that bet. I'm only following a small amount of the Twitter population, but none are under 18. Oh wait. You said "mentally." I get it. I think. I'm not so smart.
    • cfurlin, on 04/04/2008, -2/+12I know I've said this before on other threads, but it drives me crazy that people think their lives are so interesting that others actually care what they had for dinner or what they will wear tomorrow.

      Twitter is nothing more than mental masturbation for attention whores. It took me only a day or two to figure that out. It's like getting spam, but actual spam is a lot fore interesting.
      • arobar, on 04/04/2008, -0/+6If that's what you think you're not following the right people. Take a few noteworthy tech people and follow them on Twitter, you get fun tidbits that you miss out on with the larger blog posts. Jeff Pulver's feed is great, and so it Leo Laporte's.
        • cfurlin, on 05/02/2008, -0/+0"noteworthy" "tech" "people" ... 3 words that should never be used in the same sentence. :-)
    • Matt2k, on 04/04/2008, -2/+1> Twitter is nothing more than mental masturbation for attention whores. It took me only a day or two to figure that out.

      Yeah. That or a ***** version of idling in an IRC channel all day. Only with shorter messages, no scripts or interesting discussions.

      Don't get me wrong, I get the idea. If you have a close knit group of friends, and you want to tell everyone to meet you at the bar downdown. I can buy that-- I guess. But these people who sit on there all day and post stupid ***** on twitter about their blog and twittering and RSS and what they just read on the internet or that they're bored at this current moment, or pretend that this is an actual conversation medium? ***** that
    • maexus, on 04/04/2008, -0/+3I follow a lot of people in tech. Developers mainly. The nice thing about twitter is the only real "community" section is the public timeline. I find new people through people I following. A constant stream of good content. People just follow the wrong people.
  • zombird, on 04/03/2008, -10/+51you have to be pretty self absorbed to think people give a ***** about your every mundane task.
    • turoczy, on 04/03/2008, -5/+18I can't be the only one completely vapor locking on the irony inherent in this comment, can I?
    • overbyte, on 04/03/2008, -3/+2trick is to find people that don't do that
    • cubedcompanies, on 04/03/2008, -8/+3there's actually a lot of viability and usability in the service for those that aren't pessimistic, technology douche bags.
  • gokhanege, on 04/03/2008, -6/+0http://www.prefabrik.tv/index.html
  • swirlee, on 04/03/2008, -6/+1I'm a big fan of Tiny Twitter for Windows Mobile.
  • Bukowsky, on 04/03/2008, -2/+4At the moment I just IM... but lately, I've heard alot of good things about TwitterFox. Can anyone confirm that they use this plugin and like it?
    • overbyte, on 04/03/2008, -0/+3I've had it since i saw it on this article (about 5 minutes) and i must say it's nice to get rid of one of the apps on my desktop (twitteriffick)
    • overbyte, on 04/03/2008, -0/+3really liking the integration with firefox - you can link the page you're on straight to the client, a bit like the digg plugin for firefox
      recommended
    • karenflower, on 04/03/2008, -0/+2I too love the integration, it's perfect if you use Firefox a lot. Highly recommended. :)
    • Matt2k, on 04/04/2008, -1/+1Well jesus. Too bad there's no way to find out if it's any good in the next five minutes. Better post a question.
  • overbyte, on 04/03/2008, -2/+4oooo - TwitterFox
    ~completely changes lifestyle
  • clesch, on 04/03/2008, -6/+2Argh, they should fix their account restoration process instead.
    Hint: Don't delete your Twitter account while you're drunk :(
    • clesch, on 04/03/2008, -4/+1ok, that was totally irrelevant to this article. Yeah yeah, I'm supposed to RTFA and then comment.
  • Rotzooi, on 04/03/2008, -3/+10I'm either way avant-garde (probably), or I'm just not getting it. I really hate Twitter. Because, why? What new advantage does it offer me?
    • Angostura, on 04/03/2008, -2/+17"What new advantage does it offer me?"

      Well, none really if you're over 12 years of age.
    • Hangly, on 04/04/2008, -1/+3No way dude Twitter is groundbreaking and really about to take off. Spamming a few more articles on digg is sure to do the trick!
    • Pelenclerk, on 04/04/2008, -0/+2It's like having your status on facebook, except you can't do anything else on the site but update your status.
  • LANjackal, on 04/03/2008, -5/+5Twitter just does one thing and one thing really well. You can tell the entire world what you're up to. And that's it. It's kinda cool if you want to broadcast yourself
    • positron, on 04/04/2008, -0/+4I can do the same thing by setting a custom status in my IM client, without annoying the rest of the world with my narcissism.
      • cubedcompanies, on 04/04/2008, -4/+1obama has a twitter page... and a lot of the community sites i visit have them too... it's more of a RSS for life and teh web sphere. the narcissism comments stem from ignorance and being short-sighted about new ways to use teh cloud. :)

        i was on the fence for about a year too but kept an eye on it, now that i'm using it i like it.
  • MaximeLife, on 04/03/2008, -7/+1cool
  • vkoser, on 04/03/2008, -4/+2damn my app didn't make the list :) , anyway if your on a winmo phone, I think there's still some of us non iPhone users out there, check out ceTwit http://www.kosertech.com for a totally ad free always will be free windows mobile client
  • bobthebuilder25, on 04/03/2008, -1/+8Lol... "ecosystem". Eat my ass.
  • lane.montgomery, on 04/03/2008, -1/+2Digsby FTW! I just started using it today and I love it's Twitter functionality.
  • Tenlow, on 04/03/2008, -2/+2And here I thought twitter was just for cell phones. Turns out I'm glad I don't use it. Dodgeball for the win.
  • EasySt, on 04/03/2008, -2/+1There is a Chumby Widget, for Twitter too, but it looks like they missed that one...
    http://www.chumby.com
  • mystere, on 04/03/2008, -2/+24Add me to the list of "I don't get it"s. I don't understand why millions of people WANT the world (or even just close friends) to know everything we're doing (or even just a few things). It seems like a collossal waste of time, given that most people (even those people who you are close to) probably don't want to know that you just ate apple pie, or took a crap.

    There's such a thing as too much information (even an acronym for it). Well, this is just WTMI (WAY TMI).

    Not only that, but it completely obliterates small talk. Your friend calls and says "Hey, what are you up to?... oh wait, we're both on twitter, i know what you're up to.. umm.. uhhh.. nice weather we're having... oops, yeah i know, you mentioned that it's raining on twitter.. umm... uhh... ***** it.. talk to you later.,"

    It makes one of the few joys in life so impersonal. And it lets you be a douchebag about it.
    • boodog, on 04/04/2008, -0/+3Go get some friends or people you want are interested in and start following them on Twitter. You will see why it's going to be as big as txt mssging, email and Instant messaging! No doubt!
  • darkmotion, on 04/03/2008, -1/+1I like tweeter for its grow notifications and webcam support :)
  • bigteebo, on 04/03/2008, -2/+7Does the world really need to know what everyone had for breakfast, lunch, dinner, etc? Again, hourly updates of everyone's lives seems like overkill. I'm not going to race to the computer every hour.
    • Macskeeball, on 04/04/2008, -0/+3I wholeheartedly agree, but a lot of people use Twitter from their phone (via SMS). I actually use Twitter for a completely different purpose than most people. I wrote a script that runs daily on my server and post to twitter if there are updates available, which in turn gives me an RSS feed so that I can be automatically notified. That's a benefit of their being so many ways to update Twitter: you can do more with it than the rather stupid purpose it was designed for.
    • arobar, on 04/04/2008, -0/+2I read a lot of comments like yours, but they all scream "I've never used the product". Don't just watch the stupid video that explains what Twitter is, actually use it. Follow a few noteable techies. There are some great mini-posts out there.
  • shaps776, on 04/03/2008, -2/+2Digsby is #24 on the list - only two weeks after launch! (plug)
    • iofthestorm, on 04/04/2008, -0/+1Public launch maybe, but it was out a while before that in private beta, but you just had to email them for a registration key.
  • Hindu_Wardrobe, on 04/03/2008, -2/+2I like gtwitter, personally. http://code.google.com/p/gtwitter/
  • cjnkns, on 04/03/2008, -5/+7Twitter - who uses that crap?
  • invader, on 04/04/2008, -2/+4What is Twitter?
  • positron, on 04/04/2008, -3/+3The should rename it *****.
  • koft, on 04/04/2008, -2/+1Before twitter I never gave a ***** about letting people know I'm taking a dump, eating lunch, driving home from work or playing a video game. Now that we have twitter, I still don't give a *****. Why on Earth would I spend any time posting up frequent updates about what I'm doing through out the day? Props to the twitter folks though, wish I had come up with the idea, apparently there are enough people out there who like it enough, making this a cash cow.
  • Hangly, on 04/04/2008, -2/+1Die twitterspam die!
  • boodog, on 04/04/2008, -0/+1Twitter is where it is at! All I want to know is whats going on with friends and where. Also view their photos. Isn't that what we all do on social networks anyway? Short, simple and easy - yet addictive!
    Note: I used to be a hater too!
  • bryceman111, on 04/04/2008, -2/+1You should check out tumblr, kind of like the same type of thing -- microblogging, but much cooler/neater. tumblr.com --I don't use it often but I think it is really nice ;)
  • DarthBrady, on 04/04/2008, -0/+2pownce users can use both with twitterfeed. but thats old news.
  • spreadfunkyness, on 04/04/2008, -0/+0check this list here: http://twitter.pbwiki.com/Apps
    let me suggest Posty: http://spreadingfunkyness.com/posty-beta2/
  • enjourni, on 04/04/2008, -0/+1Twitter, social networks, youtube, etc: they all survive on the same thing: FAME. People like to think they are cool or special somehow, so posting every stupid little thing about themselves gives them that. I don't get it, I think it's a huge waste of time, but it doesn't seem to be a waste of time for self-conscious high schoolers with too much time on their hands. Friends are all they really care about, so friend networks take up 90% of their time.

    Honestly I think if people care so much about what I am doing they should take the time to ask me. Maybe I'm weird.
  • imitationflavor, on 04/04/2008, -0/+1Nice to know the "im takin a shyt" kind of guy is probably paying $.99 per SMS to say it.
  • Pelenclerk, on 04/04/2008, -0/+1Twitter seems to me like the status feature on facebook, except you can't look at it when your on facebook doing the rest of your networking. Is it worth that much to be able to do it with a cell phone?
    • skhisma, on 04/04/2008, -0/+1For what it's worth you can tie facebook's status in with twitter. Shrug.
    • skhisma, on 04/04/2008, -0/+1For what it's worth you can tie facebook's status in with twitter. Shrug.
  • skhisma, on 04/04/2008, -0/+1From the article:
    "Because we ran our script on a shared host, we limited our script to running at 60 second intervals and grabbed the 20 tweets listed in the public feed every 60 seconds. Since there many have been more than 20 tweets each minute we probably missed a handful of them..."

    I think it's safe to say that there are more than 20 tweets per minute. In fact this post* seems to suggest there's 1000+ tweets per minute (on average). Not that only grabbing the first 20 is going to drastically affect which clients you see, but it just seemed like a silly comment to say "there _may_ have been more than 20 tweets each minute"
    * http://twitterfacts.blogspot.com/2007/06/twitter-m ...
  • linuxtraveler, on 04/04/2008, -0/+1Waooo there is a lot of Japanese client
  • Lollerskater, on 04/04/2008, -0/+1Twitter is a great way to find out where parties are. Or, in the case of yesterday's live Diggnation, free beer!
  • FaceySpacey, on 04/04/2008, -0/+1 c u all on twitter: http://twitter.com/FaceySpacey_com
  • Commodore13, on 04/04/2008, -0/+1Digg used to be for tech lovers, when did the technophobes join?
    why are you people so afraid of twitter?
  • dmcorp, on 04/10/2008, -0/+1The Ultimate in Web 2.0 Social Networking Tools

    I signed up for a Twitter account over a year ago. At first I didn't get it. Few people used it and the posts were pretty lame. Why on earth would I care if someone was sitting in a cafe eating a veggie sandwich?

    Well, like most mediums, given enough time and critical mass, they mature. Twitter has emerged into one of the most powerful Web 2.0 social networking tools. And it's one that you can use to your advantage.

    So what exactly is microblogging or "tweeting" as it's known on Twitter? Here's the deal...

    You try and answer the question "What are you doing right now?" in 140 characters or less. One click of the update button and you tell all your friends. That's all there is to it.

    If you make quality posts, balancing insight, provocative thoughts and self promotions, you can get a lot of followers in a hurry. With every pithy post, you're likely to spark discussions, get traffic and find that more people are subscribing to your thoughts, or "following" your Tweets.

    It works the other way too. Many thought leaders post 10 times per day, and you'll be surprised what you can learn in less than a month, by following a few well-known "A List" bloggers and new media people.

    - I found out about an upcoming affiliate program and was able to position myself for the launch with little competition.

    - I was told about fantastic widgets and Wordpress blog plugins, that I didn't know about.

    - I heard rumors of new SEO software and was able to offer my ideas at the development stage.

    - I was informed of a live discussion with a controversial author and was able to participate in the show.

    - I was one of the first people to post a comment on a leading marketing blog. It branded my name, positioned me as an expert, and got a lot of clicks to my website. (Which means more subscribers and revenue for me.)

    - I've been involved in personal conversations with thought leaders. (Not likely they'd open an email from me, even if I knew their addy.) They chat openly, even with strangers, over Twitter.

    - I've been invited to impromptu hallway and pub interviews with experts streaming live video from their cell phones.

    - One prominent personality managed to get over 270 viewers to a live streaming broadcast, within five minutes of posting the invitation on Twitter.

    - I witnessed a well written blog post go from 0 to 100 Diggs in less than 10 minutes, because of a single "vote for my post" request on Twitter. (Just imagine the traffic you'd get from being on the Digg home page!)

    * Warning: 1960's Superman cartoon reference...

    Look up in the sky... it's a bird... it's a plane... faster than speeding RSS, more powerful than a blog post, able to leap tall emails with a single post... it's Twitter!

    Think of it this way... Twitter is the ultimate web 2.0 social networking or "tell-a-friend" tool.

    At only 140 characters, it's a great way to keep in touch with your readers in-between newsletters and blog posts. It's also a funky way to write and build up a following, if you're not into writing lengthy ebooks, newsletters or blog posts.

    For example, if you want to follow what I'm doing online, you can go to Twitter.com and sign up for an account. (It takes less than 10 seconds.) You'll - at the very least - want to register your favorite name before it gets taken.

    Then - once you've joined - go to http://twitter.com/dmcorp and click on the Follow button underneath my photo. That's all there is to it. If you want my updates to appear on your computer screen in real time, install a Twitter client like the one from Twhirl.org.

    Now every time I post to my blog or discover something new, you'll be kept in the loop. You'll know exactly what I'm up to during the day, what I'm working on, what's coming up next, and get inside tips as they happen.

    So what's my conclusion on using Twitter for social networking?

    If you offer your followers thoughtful posts, topical news, cool ideas, useful urls, and the like - instead of what kind of sandwich you're eating - who knows... you could build your own following. Then next time you have an event, or important moment of any kind, you can notify hundreds of people the instant it's happening.

    Like it or not, micro blogging has grown and matured as a medium. It has found a comfortable niche in-between emails and blog posts. But the really cool part is that it's happening in real time, right before your eyes, and you get to choose which gurus, bloggers, movers and shakers, that you want to follow.

    Twitter is pure Web 2.0 power in the hands of the people. It's the essence of social media, the ultimate social networking tool, where we can stay connected to each other, no matter what we're doing, or where we are in the world, 140 characters at a time.

    Send me - twitter.com/dmcorp - a Tweet when you get there...
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