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HelloTxt is a service that lets you fill out a quick form and post the same update to several popular “micro blogging” service like Twitter, Jaiku, Pownce, Tumblr and more. Just enter your message, your login details, and boom, send to as many of the services as you want. Slick. The look and feel of the site is very hip and “web 2.0″, though I hate even saying those words. I’d love to see an API for this site, though you could do the same thing yourself with the APIs for the services that have them and cURL for those that don’t. Very cool service though.

Technorati Tags: Twitter, Twitter Hacks, Twitter Tools, HelloTxt, Jaiku, Tumblr

Twitter has been described as “micro blogging” for some time now, and blogging has always felt a bit like navel gazing to me. So by that logic Twitter would be Micro Navel Gazing (TM). Enter Twitter Stats, The Atomic Navel Gazer!

All joking aside, Twitter Stats looks pretty slick. It’s written perl, which is the only complaint I have about it. Don’t get me wrong, perl is a great language, I just don’t like it! Twitter Stats should run on any system that supports perl and the modules required for this script. It looks like it was developed on a Mac, but any nix computer and probably windows with perl on it should work. Damon (the author) suggested a web create a web service out of this, which I think is a great idea. So much so, I checked to see if TwitterStats.com was available and it’s already registered. Hopefully to Damon, but the whois info is private so it’s hard to say.

via Nicki via Download Squad

Technorati Tags: Twitter, Twitter Hacks, Twitter Stats, Mashups

There have been a few search based mashups with Twitter popping up. While Twitter had a “Find & Follow” feature, it’s just not as good as some of the others around, including TwitDir. Just type in a name (or part of one) and it’ll find all the matching results showing you their pictures, locations, about info, last up and some twitter stats (following, followers, favorites, updates) and if they are in the top 100 for those. Overall, very slick. Check out the search results for my name Chrispian or go more broad and check out Chris, for example. Nice work.

Technorati Tags: Twitter, Twitter Hacks, Twitter Directory, TwitDir

Linux users, specifically those using the Gnome desktop have another option for a Twitter Clienter: Twitux. The software seems to have the usual Twitter features and looks clean and solid. Any linux users tried it yet? What do you think? I’ll try to get it setup on my dev box and try it out.

via Phorolinux.

Technorati Tags: Twitter, Twitter Hacks, Linux, Gnome, Twitux

Most of my friends spend work on the Internet and always have their email open. Most of them are also what I would call “power” users and want to load only as many apps as necessary to save precious system resources. Since they are already in email, being able to send and receive tweets via email would be pretty slick indeed. OutTwit offers that ability to people who use Microsoft Outlook. The screenshots look great and I like the idea of organizing tweets using an email client. It’s something people are used to doing already anyway. The only complaint I’ve seen is for people who follow a ton of folks. They end up with a ton of extra emails! I’m sure a few settings tweeks and a rule/filter should reduce the clutter. Looks like a pretty solid twitter client.

via Nicki!

Technorati Tags: Twitter, Twitter Hacks, Twitter Client, Outlook, OutTwit

TweeterBoard is a pretty new service that attempts to track the top 100 folks on Twitter. You can view the top 100, who’s popular today, this week, all time and who’s using the @ the most, along with a who’s gaining list. TweeterBoard’s about section says they are tracking about 2600 people at the moment and hopefully they’ll get it so they are tracking everyone. Now that I have a list of the top 100, I know who to add to my ‘following’ and try to get them to follow me so I can make the cut! ;)

For more info, ReadWriteWeb has a great post up on TweeterBoard.

h/t to Nicki

Technorati Tags: Twitter, Twitter Hacks, TweeterBoard

T-Mobile has, for yet some unknown reason, decided to blog access to Twitter. My guess? All those people with unlimited text using the crap out of their bandwidth. Biz from Twitter confirms via this comment

Hey folks. T-Mobile has definitely turned us off without notification. At Twitter we make great effort to be in compliance with all the carrier “playbooks.” We’re still trying to find out why T-Mobile has taken this action—as soon as we find out, we’ll let you know.

I guess T-Mobile has never gone up against the Blogosphere before. If they truly are trying to block the service long term and not just to work out some sort of deal with Twitter then they are about the feel the full weight of the kind of negative press only bloggers can provide. T-Mobile is not only doing something entirely shitty (blocking a number simply because it’s not a partner) but they are also dropping the ball in terms of communicating what’s going on. They didn’t notify the guys over at Twitter about why they were being dropped and one blogger got this pathetic response:

T-Mobile would like to bring to your attention that the Terms and Conditions of service, to which you agreed at activation, indicate “… some Services are not available on third-party networks or while roaming. We may impose credit, usage, or other limits to Service, cancel or suspend Service, or block certain types of calls, messages, or sessions (such as international, 900, or 976 calls) at our discretion.” Therefore, T-Mobile is not in violation of any agreement by not providing service to Twitter. T-Mobile regrets any inconvenience, however please note that if you remain under contract and choose to cancel service, you will be responsible for the $200 early termination fee that would be assessed to the account at cancellation.

You can read the full email exchange here.

This should be interesting.

Technorati Tags: Twitter, Twitter Hacks, T-Mobile

I’ve been seeing TwitterBerry pop up in Twitter messages a lot lately but it didn’t really click that it was a new client for the Blackberry until Nicki brought it to my attention today. Twitter is addictive. The Blackberry has often been called the CrackBerry. Can you make a Blackberry more addictive?

I’m just jealous there isn’t a Twitter app for my Sidekick!

Technorati Tags: Twitter, Twitter Hacks, Twitter Clients, TwitterBerry, Blackberry

I logged into Twitter today and found this waiting for me:

Twitter will be offline this Saturday from 10am to 10pm PST for maintenance.

Sorry for misleading title *evil grin*.

Update: From Biz @ The Twitter Blog:

We have a big maintenance job to do this weekend. There’s a note in the Twitter UI now but it bears repeating here. We’re going to be taking Twitter offline this Saturday from 10am to 10pm PST for maintenance. This includes the Twitter.com web site, SMS interaction, IM interaction, and even API projects like Twitterrific. Tell your friends!

Technorati Tags: Twitter, Twitter Hacks, Twitter Maintenance

Duncan over at TechChrunch asks Twitter As a Conduit For Fiction?

Last week we ran a story on figures out of Japan where half of the top ten selling works of fiction are written on mobile phones; people (not surprisingly) thought this was rather odd, but sales figures don’t lie.

What’s sad is people see this as “new”. The idea was old before the internet and once the web hit people stared sites and or sections of writing sites where users could come and contribute a line to a story. Sometimes more, of course. Most of the time this doesn’t work. Some anonymous jerk will come along and try to hijack or ruin the story. Because Twitter requires accounts it might cut down on that a little, but anyone can create an account. Someone want to set a timer? :)

If they have a little bit of moderation and editing for the finished project it could still turn out cool. Even if it doesn’t work it’s still a fun idea made new again with Twitter.

Technorati Tags: Twitter, Twitter Hacks, Twitter Fiction