Why @twimbow is my favorite twitter client

It started with a tweet.

I've been on twitter for some time (two and a half years as I write this) and tried out a few clients pretty early in that span. I rejected the Adobe AIR based apps - I really couldn't stand the reactivity - and jumped to Seesmic's Web app the second it was launched. Almost a year ago, I mentioned something about the app when I received a tweet from @filos, asking if I wanted to try a new app on the block called Twimbow. Never one to say no to a new piece of tech, I have been an avid Twimbow user since.

The other day I came across a post titled 'Twimbow: the 'Apple' of Social Media Dashboards' and I think I couldn't have put it better than that. Having watched Twimbow from version 0.1 to the current 1.1, the client has matured and grown through an innovative approach and a smart expansion strategy.

To start off, Twimbow looks something like this:

Screen_shot_2011-05-30_at_10
I actually wrote out this post twice. The first time, I attempted to list out every feature in Twimbow that I use and enjoy. Turns out, I use close to 100% of them and this post was too long to publish. So I'm going with another angle: the top 5 reasons why I use Twimbow over other clients. So here we go:

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Confessions of a teenage drama queen

Right, so my post refers to this article, written about this event. It's fairly obvious from the comments section of the article that I felt rather strongly about the way it was written, because it represented very poor journalism on various grounds. Rather than go point by point on the issues I had with the article (I tried starting the post that way, but boy did it get too long), I've decided to approach it from another angle.

Before I do that, let me start by saying I did not agree at all with the policy in question. Refusing entry — based on clothing, especially if that clothing has cultural or religious significance — to a networking event, isn't right. I don't know if the venue should have been different, or something. To be honest, it's a bit of a double-edged sword: the law attempts to protect the culture and us, as humans, want to be treated equally and not denied entry to networking events. 

If you don't know them already, allow me to introduce you to the Society of Professional Journalists. I'll let you read on-line what the organization stands for, but I'm going to bring up, in detail, their code of ethics.

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Is it time to reimagine your product / service?

Interesting read on the constantly changing face of web applications, such as facebook, in an attempt to stay more relevant.

Is it time to reimagine your product / service?

In his on stage interview with Michael Arrington (at the Crunchies), Mark Zuckerberg made the most insightful observation of the evening. On being asked about privacy, Mark said that Facebook default settings from private to public since that is what it would have been like if it started today. Things were very different when they started 6 years ago in his dorm at Harvard. People were questioning the basic concept – why should I share my info on the web. Things have changed a lot since then. People share a lot of their life online on different places on the web.

If Facebook started today, they would take where the web is today into account. The default would be public rather than private. And this is why they changed defaults from private to public since they want service to remain relevant. Mark added that it was not an easy move – from a technical or a user perspective – to change a service with 300 million users on such a core dimension.

I have been very critical of Facebook’s change from private to public, but as a owner of a web service, I completely understand where Mark is coming from. How many of us are stuck at the point where we started – not been able to imagine what our service would be like if we started today. Our services are vintage the year which they started. Flickr is vintage 2004 when it started. Basecamp is vintage 2004. Delicious is vintage 2005. While they remain great services, there has been no re-imagining of the service so that it fits into the web of 2009-2010.

The problem with being the vintage of your launch year is that the domain gets reimagined. You get left behind even if you are doing everything right. This is the classic problem that so many companies face – they are innovative when they launch. They continue on the path they launch with, which they get traction with initially. At a certain point, they are executing so well, that they get left behind. Their success contains the seeds of their becoming obselete.

Facebook is avoiding that problem by constantly imagining what it would be like if it launched today. It might face criticisms and even loose some users with such moves, but it fits better into the web today. And ultimately this is why Facebook will survive and prosper.

Ask yourself – what would my service be like if it launched today? Is it substantially different than what you are now? It might be time to reimagine it.

via rashmisinha.com

 

Web Apps: The here and now

The reason people don't realize how widespread Web Applications really are is because they're ingrained in everything we do.  Software has always been available in a client-server architecture. Gmail, Yahoo! or Hotmail are just so much a part of our lives that we've been using them for years, over a decade even (Yahoo! and Hotmail began operating in the late 90's), without realizing that we had given into the Cloud way back then.

The spread of the web has allowed for more and more web-enabled applications. Plus, it's just easier. You can update, tweak and re-vamp the Web site without even touching anything at the end-user. The user just points his web browser back at the URL and continues operating. Very few web apps actually require something to be installed at the client site.

Today this concept has just taken off, giving rise to what we could call the Cloud Computing Era. More and more applications are web enabled today, in fact users even ask for this as part of their feature requirements. Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) is now a sassy (get it?) way to go, allowing users to pay on-demand, when they want, how much they want and for how long they want.

All this is super, but now we hit the problem. Even if we assume that users are happy with the level of security, with the size of the 'cloud' increasing and the number of users increasing, this is getting harder and harder. To be able to protect applications and data in various dimensions continues to provide a challenge. Secure protocol, secure passwords and other security architecture are various pieces to a large puzzle, but security action is typically reactive. A hacker is working with outwitting what's already out there, security personnel are working with blocking whatever the hacker comes up with - and that's an unknown.

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