Twitter for Dummies - Laura Fitton [110]
Nowadays, we have ExecTweets to let you easily follow the tweets of some of the world’s smartest, most successful executives. Richard Branson? Check. Jack Welch? Check. Dive in and find inspiration, leadership, ideas, and resources from some of the brightest business minds in the world.
EpicTweet
www.epictweet.com
Type: Entertainment. EpicTweet is a service that delivers only the tweets that Twitter users have determined to be the funniest, most retweeted, most important, or smartest. Twitter users vote on which tweets get included. An example:
“BarackObama: We just made history. All of this happened because you gave your time, talent and passion. All of this happened because of you. Thanks” 2:34 PM November 5, 2008 (http://twitter.com/BarackObama/status/992176676)
Link Bunch
http://linkbun.ch
Type: URL shortener. In Chapter 7, we discuss that you can use Twitter to link to one URL, but Link Bunch offers a URL shortener for bundles of links. It takes several links and shortens them into one minimal URL that people can click to access the links. When the user clicks the Link Bunch link, he’s taken to a page where he sees all the links you bunched together and click on whichever ones he’s interested in.
Tweetree
www.tweetree.com
Type: Reading. This little service threads your tweets into a tree, which includes inline links, videos, and other files. If you think the Adobe Air application that you use to view Twitter leaves your stream looking cluttered, or if you have a hard time following conversational “threads” back and forth, Tweetree might be your answer to making your Twitter conversations easier to read.
TwitterGrader
http://twitter.grader.com
Type: Directory. This Twitter-based service ranks you using a secret formula developed by its creators at HubSpot. The system takes into account not only how many followers you have, but how you converse and engage, who follows, talks to and retweets you, who you follow and more. Your TwitterGrade of ## is a percentile, claiming that you are more, well, gradeable, than ##% of other Twitterers. The service helps you see how you measure up to other tweeters around the Web and specifically in your area and helps you find people whom you may want to follow because they mesh well with your ranking, interests, and location. Ultimately the grade doesn’t mean a whole lot, but it will definitely show you who is active in your area.
Blip.fm
http://blip.fm
Type: Multimedia sharing. You can use this Twitter-based music service to DJ songs onto Twitter. It has an outstanding database of songs, and the service allows you to make mixes for your Twitter following.
Chapter 16
Ten Cool Ways to Use Twitter
In This Chapter
Making education fun and accessible
Getting a planned event up and running
Fixing problems (and brand images) through customer service on Twitter
You can use Twitter for much more than keeping up with your friends and family. Track your expenses, get your latest homework assignment, get restaurant reviews or recommended wines. . . . The possibilities are endless and expanding every day. In this chapter, we introduce you to ten cool ways you can use Twitter.
Plain Old Networking
Twitter is an extremely powerful networking tool for several reasons. As contrived as it is when you think about it, in practice, Twitter actually mimics the natural process of how humans get to know one another. People don’t like demanding, confrontational, face-to-face interaction; they prefer side-by-side, random interaction around gradually discovering the things they have in common. Routine, random, low-level interactions weave the fabric of community that builds trust and holds us all together. Twitter also creates an environment of random interactions that’s really conducive to discovering new people with shared interests and for getting to know a more total picture of who someone is and what interests them.
On a strictly utilitarian basis, just being able to forge an electronic connection using something