TwiTip » Lara Kulpa

Twitter Kicks More 3rd Party Sites To The Curb

Lara Kulpa — Tue, 31 May 2011 11:25:20 +0000

Photosharing on Twitter has historically been left up to sites like Yfrog and Twitpic, and according to news posted very late last night on TechCruch, 3rd party photosharing is about to become a thing of the past.

Twitter has been spending money left and right, and it seems that every time we turn around, they’re doing something to demolish what people have been used to. Their reasoning, they claim, is that they’re working to “avoid having the user stream disrupted”. Personally, I think it’s because they would rather make the money from advertising themselves, and not allow others to gain financially from the use of their API. They’ve got to pay back their investors somehow… right?

So rather than hire the brains behind the great ideas, they’re going to once again render them useless. They’re playing a much meaner game than Monopoly here, simply because they can. They’ve got the big bucks, as proven by their recent spend of $40M on TweetDeck.

I’m not a fan of web companies forgetting where they came from. I was actually okay with the purchase of TweetDeck, because it meant that the TD devs were recognized for their hard work in some way that actually satisfied them. I’m also aware that they can’t simply go around buying up existing companies, and that for all we know, they did try to buy up Twitpic and were refused. I’m sure we’ll find these things out sooner or later, but for the time being, I think it’s just pretty crappy to take over others’ ideas and make them your own because you’re afraid they’re making money you should be making.

Am I being unreasonable? I’m all for businesses growing, making more money, etc. but I’ve got issue with stepping on the hands of those that have fed you for years.

Twitter Stalking via SMS

Lara Kulpa — Wed, 11 Aug 2010 18:55:46 +0000

So you’ve always been able to “Twitter Stalk” someone by just going to their Twitter page (example: www.twitter.com/personyoustalk) but now there’s an easier way, via your cell phone.

Twitter’s launched this with the idea that you can get Twitter updates from your favorite companies, as many tend to tweet out offers that are only available to the Twitterati. However now you can utilize “Fast Follow” by texting “follow USERNAME” to 40404. You’ll then start receiving all of updates from that user via texts on your phone.

Personally, I do use the mobile interface for Twitter, but really only for DMs (direct messages). It’s kind of like text messaging to me that way. Not sure I’ll ever use “Fast Follow” but it’s nice that it’s so much more easily available to those of us without super computers for phones!

PS – Currently, “Fast Follow” is only available in the US, but they say they’re working on implementing it for other countries.

Did Twitter Kill the Video Star?

Lara Kulpa — Wed, 28 Jul 2010 11:34:49 +0000

Today’s post comes from Jenni Izzo, a Drexel University graduate turned Central Florida PR professional with a social media obsession. Follow her at @jenniizzo.

It appears that MTV’s attempt at reviving itself with a Twitter Jockey (an updated version of a VJ) has fallen short. After a month of Twitter-focused challenges to find the most appropriate individual for the job (measured by MTV’s own TweetLevel), the network announced the top five contestants in their “Follow Me: The Search for MTV’s First TJ” competition – and people are angry.

See, for the duration of the competition, MTV kept an up-to-the-minute contestant ranking by measuring influence, popularity, engagement and trust. In addition to these metrics, anyone could vote for their favorite via MTV and American Express’ MTVTJ Facebook page. When voting closed, the top five were listed publicly – as they had been throughout the competition – but when the announcement was made on Friday, several of the original top five were noticeably absent.

A quick search of “@MTVTJ” shows that people aren’t just voicing their complaints – they want answers. With more than ten Twitter accounts, MTV is notoriously chatty, but they’ve remained completely silent on the topic.

The way the situation is currently being handled is only making things worse – MTV and American Express are deleting the negative Facebook comments.

It’s been almost a week now, and the competition’s blog, Facebook and Twitter have not been used to confront the complaints. In a world where we are all still navigating the slippery slope that is social media, what will MTV and American Express’ (lack of) reaction mean for their image? Social media is a two-sided conversation, and you can’t expect to talk, talk, talk, then stay silent when people ask for answers.

What are your thoughts? Has MTV put the nail in its own coffin? Will this case join Southwest in the Twitter history books – or is it merely a one hit wonder?

Top 20 Twitip Twitter Tips of All Time!

Lara Kulpa — Thu, 01 Jul 2010 12:58:51 +0000

Yes, today I’m obsessed with the letter “T”.

I was looking through the site stats this morning and decided to see what the most popular posts were here at Twitip. It’s an interesting list, with the number one post having over 384,000 views! (Number 20 on the list has just over 23,000!)

Check them out, which one’s your favorite?

Create a Custom List of Tweets with TwitBlend

Lara Kulpa — Tue, 29 Jun 2010 12:52:56 +0000

Today’s post comes from Pongrob Saisuwan of TwitBlend. He’s showing us how to use the service. You can follow Pongrob at @twitblend.

There’s so many auto-generated list of tweets out there but the results are mostly spam. So why not make it ourselves?

With a service called TwitBlend you can easily create your own “collection of tweets” or “tweet list” yourself and it’s very easy to use!

This is what I got from spending two minutes on TwitBlend, The Foursquare Cling

TwitBlend helps you search for tweets and arrange, color, share and put it on your website.

How can I make one?

Click on “Create new blend” on top-right menu
Enter your Twitter’s account information and click “Allow” to login (TwitBlend uses Twitter’s API so you don’t need to sign up separately.)
This is “New Blend” page. You can use menu on left-side to search for your tweets, you can see your tweets from your “Home” timeline, “@ mentions”, “Sent by you” and your favourites. You can also find tweets from your own list.
There’s a search tab for you to search tweets from a keyword or username.

Below is the search dialog:
After you search for tweets you will see something like this:
You can drag and drop tweets from the right side to the dropbox on the left side, arrange and color it with “color button” on the bottom of each tweet.
After you are happy with this list you can click “Save…” at the bottom.
In this save dialog you can enter the title and tweet it to share it with your friends.
Now that you have created your own blend, you can share it with your friends or put it on your website using TwitBlend’s widget. Below is an example of TwitBlend widget on my Wordpress blog.

Have you used TwitBlend before? Let us know what you think in the comments!

How To Incorporate Twitter Into Your Event

Lara Kulpa — Fri, 18 Jun 2010 13:22:01 +0000

[Hey everyone - our submission form has been acting up, so if you have submitted a guest post and have had troubles, please email it to me at lara@twitip.com - Thanks!]

Today’s post comes from Jenni Izzo, a Drexel University graduate turned PR Account Coordinator with a social media obsession. You can follow Jenni at @jenniizzo.

Whether large or small, Twitter can enhance your event in a number of ways. Take a hint from MTV, who recently used a live Twitter Tracker for their 2010 Movie Awards. They encouraged those in the audience, as well as those at home, to get in on the action by tweeting their thoughts, reactions and questions. Throughout the night, tweets containing “MTV” hit over 400 per minute. But, even if you aren’t planning a star-studded event, you can still use the following tips to create a tweet-worthy event.

Establish an event hashtag.
Long before you start promoting the event, create a hashtag. It should be easy to remember, short and relevant. This will be key in incorporating Twitter into your event. Include the hashtag on everything from the Evite to the Facebook page to signage at the event. Other creative ideas include: event t-shirts, business cards and centerpieces.

Create buzz before the event.
Now that you’ve established the event hashtag, get out and there use it. Tweet about sponsors, ticket sales, guest appearances and topics. Get people excited before the event and it will ensure that the enthusiasm carries over to the day-of.

Encourage attendees to tweet during the event.
Using the previously mentioned tips, make sure the hashtag is visible at the event. If you have a PowerPoint or Keynote presentation, make sure it is included on the title slide. If you will be taking planned breaks, display slide encouraging attendees to tweet — or better yet…

Host a live stream.
During scheduled downtime, replace your presentation with a live stream. A live stream should also be incorporated at all times on a projection screen. If you are announcing winners or honorees, use Twitter to share the big news. Also keep your audience actively engaged by tweeting trivia questions and giving an award to the first to tweet the correct answer.

Take advantage of post-event insight.
Twitter gives event coordinators a valuable opportunity to look back attendees’ candid thoughts. Review tweets marked with your hashtag to see what worked and what didn’t. Use this as an opportunity to improve your next event or connect with people who had further questions.

When it comes to using Twitter to enhance your event, the possibilities are endless. Feel free to add to this list and share some of your favorites in the comments.

Twitter Puts The Kibosh On Automatic Ads

Lara Kulpa — Tue, 25 May 2010 13:35:51 +0000

I first saw the news on Twitter, with a link from @blogherald to their post Twitter Kills “Pay Per Tweet” Companies (The Twitterverse Rejoices).

It looks like Twitter has finally made up its mind regarding third party tweet ad services (like Be-A-Magpie, BeTweeted and the infamous Sponsored Tweets via IZEA) and the verdict is “no ads for you!”

Then I head over to Sponsored Tweets and check out what they’ve got to say: Changes Coming to Sponsored Tweets

We are going to make some changes to the way Sponsored Tweets works. We will no longer be publishing directly to your account through the Twitter API. Instead you will have to write the tweet yourself in whatever Twitter client you see fit.

Yes, it will be a more manual process. Yes, we liked the old way better too. But we want to comply with Twitters guidelines and be a good ecosystem partner. We have always made adjustments to our system to remain in compliance. Twitter has allotted 30 days to make this change, we will try to get it out as soon as we can. Until then it is business as usual.

Seems some people are thrilled, and some are absolutely irate. Basically, Twitter seems to not be telling us what we can and can’t post, but rather HOW we post it.

… we will not allow any third party to inject paid tweets into a timeline on any service that leverages the Twitter API. We are updating our Terms of Service to articulate clearly what we mean by this statement, and we encourage you to read the updated API Terms of Service to be released shortly. (Twitter Blog)

So it’s not that you can’t, it’s just that by doing things this way, it makes it more annoying for you and they’re hoping you give up entirely.

They claim it’s for the “long term health of the Twitter ecosystem”. Some feel that it’s simply because they don’t want anyone making money until they do.

What are your thoughts?

Poll & Discussion: Is Twitter Still Awesome?

Lara Kulpa — Mon, 12 Apr 2010 13:38:30 +0000

Note: There is a poll embedded within this post, please visit the site to participate in this post's poll.

Just curious – I’m wondering how many of you still find Twitter to be as interesting and awesome as you used to find it.

For newer Twits, it may very well be. For those of us who were “early adopters”, we’ve got clearly different experiences. I remember Twitter before every television show and celebrity and news station had a Twitter account. Before every business went to crazy lengths to get followers. And before it became a place over-run with teenagers Tweeting about crazy sexual stuff. I remember when it was truly a networking place between colleagues, old and new. It was fun to go and see what some of the people I look up to in my field were reading or writing or talking about.

My personal feeling? There’s lots of clutter in Twitter these days. People who follow you in hopes of you following them back so they can increase their follower count, only to unfollow you if you don’t reciprocate, or once they’ve got you following them.

What do you think? Vote, and then discuss your answer in the comments!

Bringing Reader Questions Back To TwiTip

Lara Kulpa — Thu, 07 Jan 2010 14:50:07 +0000

Image via Wikipedia

Okay so last year I ran a few posts featuring reader questions I’d received through the contact form. It was great because I’d post the question and then the readers would comment to help answer them.

Here are a few I think worked out well last year:

Answer A Reader Question: Promoting Local Events on Twitter
Answer A Reader Question: Multiple Twitter Users In Business Answer A Reader Question: My Twitter Account Was Phished!
Answer A Reader Question: Top Tips
Answer A Reader Question: Twitter Bullies
Answer A Reader Question: Twitter Etiquette?

Since it seemed to be a pretty popular type of post (from both sides), AND because Twitter and social media relies heavily on helping people, I’d like to bring that back as a regular feature, so send in your questions!

Happy 2010! Here’s Your 2009 TwiTip Recap

Lara Kulpa — Fri, 01 Jan 2010 17:24:45 +0000

So I probably should’ve posted this yesterday, but here’s a recap of some of our most popular posts from 2009.

Happy New Year, everyone!