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Twitter

Twitter Upgrades Happening Fast

by Michelle Lentz on March 9, 2010

TechCrunch just reported that Twitter’s geolocation features are finally turned on, just in time for you to find everyone at SXSW. My own geolocation features on my Twitter account don’t seem to be active yet, forcing me to borrow a screenshot from TechCrunch (thanks guys!). As you can see, there’s a tiny blue marker that, when clicked, expands into the tweet-location.

Ok, I find geolocation on my Tweets a little creepy, but it’s the sort of thing I can see turning on for big events (like SXSW) and conferences. But for me, it certainly won’t be an everyday occurrence (or so I say now).

How do you turn on geolocation? For quite some time, there’s been a geolocation option in your profile settings. I imagine you just tick the On box. As TechCrunch said, “While Twitter’s geolocation feature has been live through its API since late last year, there was no sign of integration into the main twitter.com site until now.”  It’s worth mentioning that Facebook just announced it will start rolling out its own location features next month as well (via Mashable).

Additionally, Twitter has made a subtle but fun change to its user interface. (Come to think of it, it’s also a change that means I need to update every screenshot in a lot of my course offerings.)  We’re no longer Updating, now we’re truly Tweeting!

Update: Well, apparently Twitter changed it back to Update. :( Come on, Twitter – we liked Tweet!

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Sweet Tweets: TwitGift

by Michelle Lentz on February 25, 2010

Launched, I believe, only a few days ago, Twitgift.me, a product of the LAC Project, is a new way to send a real gift to your Twitter friends.

You simply choose a gift (which currently consists of chocolate chip, sugar, or peanut butter cookies), enter your own Twitter ID and credit card information, as well as the Twitter ID of the recipient. That’s it. The recipient gets a tweet notifying them of the Twitgift and they enter their own shipping information and can be waiting eagerly for the cookie arrival.

It’s a great concept. After all, sometimes you’ll discover wonderful people on Twitter, but you may rarely see them and never ask for their mailing address. Now you don’t have to; you can just send a Twitgift when that wonderful person has a birthday, needs a pick-me-up, or is celebrating something.

The cookies cost $19 and it looks like there is around $10 in shipping. Twitgift is looking for more vendors to add, so they won’t be an all-baked-goods type of place (not that I have any issues with cookies!).

UPDATE: The nice folks over at TwitGift sent me my own box of cookies after this post. I love chocolate chip cookies, so I couldn’t have been happier. The entire unboxing can be found in a post on my personal blog.

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Cheers!
Tweet Michelle @writetechnology, send her technology news at michelle[at]writetech[dot]net, visit her wine blog when you’re thirsty, and drop by her day job.

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The Dark Side of Location-Based Apps

by Michelle Lentz on February 17, 2010

Do you use an app like FourSquare or GoWalla to tweet out your location? I’m guilty of this – I’m Mayor of both my favorite bar and coffee shop. When I visit a new location, that information gets sent to Twitter. I’m a little different from most people – since I am twittering my location, I send it to my private and locked Twitter account. Since I approve all of my followers at that account, I’m minimizing the risk of unwanted stalking.

Do you list your home on FourSquare? I have to admit I’m always a little bit amazed by the people who list “Jones Home” and then their address. Really? I work out of my home, but my mailing address is a PO Box. I will occasionally use FourSquare to show I’m at my office, but the location that shows up is the PO Box, not my house. Again, I’m minimizing the unwanted stalking.

Today on Twitter, there’s been a lot of buzz (forgive the pun) about PleaseRobMe.com. The site wants you to be aware of what you’re doing when you tweet to the world that you’re not home.

According to the site creators,

The danger is publicly telling people where you are. This is because it leaves one place you’re definitely not… home. So here we are; on one end we’re leaving lights on when we’re going on a holiday, and on the other we’re telling everybody on the internet we’re not home. It gets even worse if you have “friends” who want to colonize your house. That means they have to enter your address, to tell everyone where they are. Your address.. on the internet.. Now you know what to do when people reach for their phone as soon as they enter your home. That’s right, slap them across the face.

So the message here is think before you tweet. After all, do you really want to be featured in the stream on PleaseRobMe?

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Cheers!
Tweet Michelle @writetechnology, send her technology news at michelle[at]writetech[dot]net, visit her wine blog when you’re thirsty, and drop by her day job.

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BlackBerry to Launch its Own Twitter App

by Kristen Nicole on February 12, 2010

BlackBerry is developing a Twitter app to run on its mobile platform, giving BlackBerry users a more integrated and dedicated tool for managing their tweets. Currently still in private beta, the app is still under wraps and in need of additional development. But the fact that Research In Motion, BlackBerry’s parent company, is creating an app for the popular microblogging service indicate’s its interest in social media and the mobile app economy.

While still ahead of Apple and Android in some regards, BlackBerry has yet to make a splash with a mobile app marketplace. A great deal of effort has been put into Apple and Android’s mobile platforms, growing their marketplaces as opportunities for developers and publishers.

As BlackBerry phones ar still well distributed amongst smartphone users, it would be in BlackBerry’s best interst to find a way in which it could incorporate a better mobile app experience. Contending with the device-specific capabilities of Apple and android mobile phones, BlackBerry has a ways to go. But at least appealing to its current user base means that the company recognizes its existing market share and the potential therein.

BlackBerry plans on making its Twitter app far more integrated than any third party Twitter app currently available for BlackBerry phones. The offering of a Twitter app from BlackBerry itself means that more options that are specific to the BlackBerry device can be incorporated. This could increase its appeal to BlackBerry users, creating a more loyal customer experience.

The benefit of doing this is, of course, the ability to better integrate a Twitter app with other aspects of the phone. Other BlackBerry apps, for instance, could be combined with the BlackBerry Twitter app, enhancing both apps duly. This is a tactic other platforms are already using, including Nokia and Google.

Nokia has its own phones, devices, apps and marketplace, giving it a unique vantage point for implementing various tactics around controlling its aspect of the mobile industry. Google has its own apps that span the web and mobile devices, along with a mobile platform and an app marketplace. The ability to reach the various access points for a mobile app gives these companies better mechanisms for serving their consumer base.

As companies look to corner the market based on their ability to appeal to consumers, the use of convenient services makes for a great offering to customers. Better integration with the tools those customers already have could mean a higher retention rate and monetization options for the companies.

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Can StopTweet Handle Twitter’s Spam Problem?

by Kristen Nicole on February 8, 2010

Spam on Twitter is an ever-growing problem. While Twitter has addressed in in one way or another these past few months, the spam is still an issue. StopTweet is a new service that aims to fill in the gaps that Twitter has left behind, seeking out bot accounts and providing you with the option to report and block those users.

The premise behind StopTweet is that it’s an easier Twitter management tool than many of the others, making it easier for the average Twitter user to set up. And StopTweet is pretty simple to use; it’s got an easily-navigated interface and several blocking and reporting options that you won’t find on Twitter’s main site.

One of the drawback’s to Twitter and its process for handling spam or abusive content and behavior on Twitter is that the company itself has to take a rather top-down approach to anything it implements. This requires overarching modifications to its system, affecting all users. Any changes made on such a high level means that individual needs aren’t being met as readily as they could through the use of third party services.

Additionally, Twitter is able to primarily address the content and behavior as it pertains to the direct use of its site. While this is useful for those that are on the main site, there is still a good amount of Twitter activity that takes place through remote interactions (email and social network integration) and third party applications.

Spam on Twitter is only getting to be a larger issue, as more automated capabilities and trends permeate throughout our Twitter culture. Many users are forgoing the regular checking of direct messages all together, because they too are riddled with bot and automated tweets that are spammy or down right annoying.

Finding the best way to deal with Twitter spam is still an ongoing issue, for Twitter as well as third party services. As Twitter continues to grow in size and reach, it’s more than likely going to find additional ways in which to help users manage the spam associated with their Twitter accounts.

We’re surely going to see a growing interest in the dealing of spam and abusive behavior on Twitter, similar to the process that was applied to the major email clients a few years back. With spam becoming such a large issue for publicaly-shared social media outlets, something more definitive will have to be instituted on a wide scale.

Even beyond Twitter, spam, malware and abusive behavior within social media networks is going to be something that the networks themselves have to deal with. As the networks open further to public sharing and forums, something will need to be done about the onslaught of spam.

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