Jon Bishop on Plurk

Jon Bishop on Rejaw

Jon Bishop on Twitter

Wouldn’t it be cool if there was some sort of centralized posting system to make your giveaway known to the world. Oh wait there is.

Something I’ve been doing to win some free stuff is monitoring search.twitter for just that… free stuff.

Search Twitter for Free Stuff

A lot of these contests are easy to join….. usually just leaving a comment on their blog. Others are kind of fun, like a best caption contest. But the more you enter, the better your chances are at winning something.

So go and win many iPhones and Wii’s. Tell them Jon sent you. It won’t help at all but it makes me feel good about myself.

Plurk and Twitter have been great fun as have Identi.ca, Kwippy and Pownce. But there’s a new guy on the block, yes another one, with another funny sounding name. Rejaw .

Once again it is too early to tell how successful this new micro-blogging platform will be. It’s up to the community to decide, which is partly why Twitter is still so popular, it has a large community.

But what does Rejaw have the Twitter and Plurk doesn’t. Let’s take a look at some of ReJaw’s features.

Top selling points:

• Real time chat - This is one of it’s top selling points
• Images and movies - Just like in Plurk
  
• Guests - Guests can comment on shouts without having an account
  

Standard functionality

• Permalinks - Just like in Plurk and Twitter
• Shouts and whispers -  Rejaw maxes out at 1000 chars
  
• API
• Follow favorite users
  

Limited functionality

• Find friends - Can only find friends from facebook and gmail
• Desktop app - Currently only available on Mac but is being extended to PC and iPhone

So what makes ReJaw worth your time?

Well Plurk’s revolutionary commenting system increased communication by making it easy to use. Rejaw takes this same idea and allows unregistered guests to comment on your posts. This brings Micro-Blogging to a new level as anonymity comes into play.

The sky’s the limit.

So what do we have here? A Twitter clone with a commenting system and the ability to easily embed Video and Images. Furthermore, the character limit has been increased to 1000 characters.

Despite it’s few shortcomings there is a bright future for this new platform. It’s only a matter of time before the Rejaw API gives birth to intuitive new applications that will challenge Twitter’s prominence.

Follow me on rejaw

So with the launch of TwitterAdder and Twitter Adder for Firefox everyone is in a stir talking about how there is finally an easy way to add friends. What do I think of this new awesome service, um, not so awesome. I feel as if it kind of defeats the purpose of Twitter and if people are looking to it as a launching point for their new account, they will be more likely to bail on Twitter.

First off, for those of you who have seen my own Twitter Adder, let it be known that I am not a hypocrite. My reasoning is that I believe Twitter is a powerful tool for connecting with like minded individuals. This is why my own Twitter Adders only add friends within the industry of your choice. So far I’ve covered 3 industries and 1 age group (which is private to 20SB members).

My favorite pitch when describing Twitter to social media newbies is that it instantly connects you to individuals of similar industries, trains of thought, and locations. If TwitterAdder becomes their premiere source of obtaining friends I believe they will lose interest in Twitter fast as 6 of their new found friends speak a different language and the other 4 never use their account.

Conclusion

I think TwitterPack and TwitterLocal are the best sources for finding new friends. The future of Twitter adders should specialize in specific demographics. I chose my microblogs like my regular blogs, quality over quantity.

The following is a quick flash application i wrote to help people quickly connect to like minded individuals. This is the first version and i will add further functionality later (adding yourself if your not on the list). I obtained these lists from twitterpacks

No passwords or usernames are saved during this process however if you’re concerned, I recommend you switch your password now, use the tool, and then switch it back to your old password.

If the tool does not work please notify me or try again later.

(Note: The app takes awhile to add everyone so you may want to let it run until your status bar says done)

You can find a similar tool by seocracy at http://www.seocracy.com/fun

In case Twitter wasn’t taking up enough of your time, there is a new guy on the block, all blinged out in Ajax, looking for a little attention. I have to say, Plurk is a pretty cool Twitter clone. It allows all of the basic features of Twitter and then its spiced up a bit.

Status Updates

Plurk’s status updates are a little smaller than Twitters and at times a little hard to read. However they do pack a little extra punch with a comment system as well as qualifiers.

Plurk(top) and Twitter(Bottom)

Twitter’s reply button sometimes just does not cut it and the more I’ve been using FriendFeed and Plurk, the more I long for such a feature. The qualifier button is also pretty dam cool. Its kind of like Twistori however it’s built into the system and you can use it to sort friends’ posts based on the qualifier.

Comment System

So now a little bit more about my favorite function of Plurk, its comment system. Its very similar to FriendFeeds comment system in that you can comment on specific status updates.

The number to the right of a post tells you how many comments that post has.

This definitely encourages more conversation as replys tend to get lost in Twitter (especially if your not using a 3rd party app). Plurk also seems very speedy in notifying you of new comments and posts.

Plurk’s Comment System

I guess you could compare it to a mini chat rather than a comment system since everything is happening in real time.

So what do I not like about Plurk?

Well besides the goofy name, I’d have to say that in the end, at least for me, simplicity wins the game. That’s why i chose Google over Yahoo and then Dreamweaver over Frontpage. But complexity aside it might be too early in the game to make an honest call on the matter. Twitter’s API makes up for what it lacks in built in features as the community is constantly pushing its boundaries (and its servers). I also found it very easy to make friends in Twitter where as in Plurk I am still at a loss. The friends I have currently are my friends from Twitter :).

Conclusion

Plurk

• Awesome comment system
• Nifty graphics
• Filtering by qualifiers

Twitter

• Simplistic
• More customization capabilities
• API

I would say that, at least for the moment, I am going to stick with Twitter because of the large amount of 3rd party apps and my cool customized home page. Plus I’d hate to have to start all over again making new friends.

Follow me on Twitter

Follow me on Plurk

About two weeks back I posted a survey “Why do you or don’t you use Twitter?”. It was interesting to see how people responded.

Why Plaxo users Tweet

(Percents represent the percentage of Plaxo users who do use Twitter)

(more…)

Everything you need to know about Twitter in as short of a post as possible.

What is Twitter?

Twitter is a social networking and micro-blogging service that allows users to send “updates” (or “tweets”; text-based posts, up to 140 characters long) to the Twitter website, via short message service (e.g. on a cell phone), instant messaging, or a third-party application such as Twitterrific or Facebook. - From Wikipedia

Commoncraft also has a pretty good explanation of what twitter is on youtube.

Here are some Twinterviews about what people love about twitter.

Who do I follow?

First thing you can do is invite all of your friends through Twitters Find & Follow page. Once that is done you can move on to websites like Who Should I Follow, Twittersearch and Twubble. (More Twitter Search Engines)

There are also lists you can scan through at TwitterPack and Twitterholic as well as some Internet Marketing Gurus on Twitter.

It is probably a good idea to view a users Twitter page before you follow them to be sure they aren’t spam.

How do i update?

There are A LOT of ways to update your twitter status. The most obvious (and sometimes most reliable) is the Twitter site itself.

There is also an array of third-party apps to help feed your twitter hunger:

• TwitterFox
• Twhirl
• Twitterrific
• Snitter
• Twitkit

Or you can automate the process with TwitterFeed.

Where else can i put my twitter feed?

You can view your feed in any feed aggregator (Google Reader, FriendFeed, Outlook, etc). Your feed can be accessed at

• http://twitter.com/statuses/user_timeline/username.rss - Your Feed
• http://twitter.com/statuses/friends_timeline/username.rss - Your Friends Feed

as well as by clicking the RSS button at the bottom of your Twitter page.

Another popular thing to do is add your Twitter feed to facebook. Twitter has its own Facebok App or you can just sync your facebook satus with Twitter. I personally chose to use FriendFeed because it was the least intrusive.

What are some cool apps I can use?

Check out the Twitter Fan Wiki Apps Page.

I hope someone found this informative. Please feel free to follow me: @spazcer