Twitter for Dummies - Laura Fitton [32]
Twitter has an official page where you can find the code for an embeddable widget, complete with step-by-step instructions for installing it. Just go to http://twitter.com/downloads.
You can find an official Twitter application for Facebook, too, which means that you can make your Twitter updates show up as your Facebook status updates, or you can display a badge of your tweets on your Facebook pro-file. You can find the Twitter application for Facebook at http://apps.facebook.com/twitter.
The Google gadget works on Google Desktop, as well as the iGoogle personal home page product. You can install the Google gadget by clicking the download button at http://desktop.google.com/plugins/i/twitter.html.
Putting Twitter on your site
You might want to go a bit beyond run-of-the-mill widgets if you’re hoping to put Twitter on another Web page seamlessly. If you have technical expertise or access to a good Web developer, you can build your own widget or plug-in for your site that uses the Open Twitter API. You can find details on building a widget at http://apiwiki.twitter.com.
If you’re not a computer programmer or developer, you probably won’t ever touch the Twitter API directly, but you will be using it — without even knowing it — every time you use a third-party application. We mention Laura’s startup project www.oneforty.com a handful of times in this book because its mission is to help those new to Twitter find the very best and most useful applications, services, and tools within the Twitter ecosystem. When it launches, please let us know whether it’s helpful to you.
Going Mobile: The Key to Happiness
In our opinion, the key to Twitter happiness is mobility. You should be able to use Twitter anywhere, anytime, and any way that you want, including on your phone. You can get this mobility via SMS (which we talk about in the “Text messages (SMS delivery)” section, earlier in this chapter) or on the Twitter Mobile Web site at http://m.twitter.com. Twitter Mobile is missing a few of the regular, Web-based Twitter site’s features (for example, you can’t see your favorites or a list of your followers), but you can use it pretty much as you do the normal site.
If you have a higher-end phone, such as the iPhone or BlackBerry, you can try out a few downloadable Twitter apps. Apple’s iPhone has a nice interface for Twitter, and you can find several options in the iTunes App Store that you can download to make Twitter on the go even easier. Some of these apps (such as Twinkle and TwitterFon) are free, some (such as Tweetie, which you can see in action in Figures 4-4 and 4-5) cost a few bucks, and some (such as Twitterrific) have both free and paid versions.
BlackBerry users have fewer applications at their disposal, including the extremely popular TwitterBerry (shown in Figure 4-6). BlackBerry users also have a challenge — the device’s specialized browser can’t display all the content on Twitter, such as photos and some links.
If you have a Windows Mobile phone, we recommend an application called ceTwit if you don’t have a touch screen. If you do have a touch screen, look into an iPhone-like interface client called PocketTwit (made by Google Labs).
The open-API difference
Twitter’s open API fuels its flexibility, and that flexibility is a big part of what keeps Twitter users loyal through all its growing pains. The API is so customizable that you can create a completely new service for Twitter on a whim, based on what you want to do with it — which is a big plus, especially if you plan to mold Twitter to fit a specific company goal or make it a big part of a marketing campaign or promotion. If you can’t find an existing application that works with Twitter to make it do exactly what you need, you can either make one yourself or hire someone to do it. Full customization is rare