Digsby Worth Checking Out

Digsby is a neat little communications program that combines IM, email and social networking websites all in one. I’ve been using Pidgin for my IM predominantly, but the addition of Twitter to Digsby makes it an attractive alternative.

For IM, Digsby handles AIM, Yahoo, Google talk, MSN, ICQ and Jabber. It seems to have most of the basic features you’d expect from an IM client and I haven’t encountered any problems yet.

You can add Gmail, Yahoo mail, Hotmail, AOL/AIM mail, POP or IMAP accounts. I’ve just used it with a Gmail account as a way to be alerted when there is incoming email, but I’m curious about the IMAP and POP functionality. One neat feature is the ability to send emails right from the IM window, without having to open another application or webpage.

For social networking, you can add your Facebook, Myspace or Twitter accounts. I currently just use Twitter, and Digsby provides me with updates to recent Twitter activity, and lets me update my status. If you use Facebook or Myspace, Digsby will alert you to new friend requests, messages and other activity.

With Twitter, the interface isn’t as customizable as Twhirl or Snitter, but so far has been more stable than either of those and doesn’t require AIR. Digsby’s Twitter pop-up notifications display all recent activity, placing @s first. There isn’t much customization available for the Twitter interface, but it handles the basics well.

For me the real strength of the program is having all these things tied together in one package. You can turn off pop up notifications and sound for any or all accounts if, for example, you only wanted to be alerted for emails and not Twitter, or you only wanted sound and no pop-ups.

Digsby is still in Beta and could use a few more features and options, but right now it behaves well and has been reliable. I’m impressed!

Twitter vs. Pownce: the Ultimate Showdown!

Apparently some people out there haven’t quite caught on to the microblogging craze, or are a bit confused about the differences between the two. Here’s a somewhat lighthearted look at the two in a no holds barred, knock down, drag out fight.

Lets get ready to rumble!

In the light blue corner, the reigning champion - Twitter.

Twitter has been around longer and has a large userbase. The number of clients, addons, extensions, related websites and methods of access is impressive. Lately though, the champ has been stumbling, suffering from extended outages and downtime.

The various clients available for Twitter, when working, are a great alternative to the web interface. My current favorites for Windows are Snitter and Twhirl, but both can be buggy at times. There are also multiple plugins for firefox available. If that’s not your cup of tea you can get at Twitter from IM or SMS. If you’re a fan of text messaging, this can be a fun way to occupy your time while riding the subway to work.

There are a large number of websites that extend Twitter’s functionality. Tweetscan lets you easily search Twitter for tweets containing certain text. Twitter Karma helps you keep track of who is following you and who you are following. Twitterpacks help you find people with the same interests as yourself. Tweetstats reports on your usages, and there are a host of other websites as well.

Reliability is an issue with Twitter, and drives people to Pownce during the downtime. Twitter officially broke up with Joyent recently, and some of the stability issues may improve. Time will tell.

In the green corner, the cagey up and comer - Pownce

Pownce has just come out of beta and has some catching up to do with regards to the number of users. A reasonable number of people have signed up, but a majority of them don’t use it much. Activity has picked up with the recent Twitter outages, but it is still far behind.

Pownce goes beyond the realm of just text and allows you to post pictures, videos, music and other files easily. Also, it’s remarkably simpler to add links just by clicking the button, compared to the usual cut and paste then tinyurl process with Twitter. Most of the videos are just youtube viral videos, but it’s a fun way to share amusing vids with friends. The ability to share photos is very cool. I threw up a picture of my dog, but there are some gifted photographers out there who frequently share some excellent material. I personally enjoy these very much. There is a lot more creative stuff being shared around on Pownce compared to the Twitter’s pure text and links.

There are a few fan created and third party applications and extensions for Pownce, but for the most part Pownce is still in the infancy stage for this category.

One cool feature in Pownce is the ability to group friends in sets. This can be useful when your friends list starts growing and you need an easy way to sort or separate them. I wish Twitter had such a feature.

Also, if you wish, Pownce has plenty of room to provide all of your other contact information like Twitter ID, Flickr, Facebook, IM, email, blog, homepage. I find this a handy way to find people on other networks. I just go to Pownce, click their profile, and presto, all the info I need. Currently Twitter just allows one link for each user.

Pownce has a nice interface for finding friends. It can easily scan your Digg, Facebook, Twitter, Flickr, GMail, Hotmail, AOLmail and Yahoo mail contacts. Twitter will only search email contacts (from the same 4).

Point by Point Comparison

Number of users/activity: Advantage Twitter, by a large margin. Pownce may slowly creep up, but Twitter has a huge head start.

Third party support, addons, and extensibility: Advantage Twitter, by a lot.

Reliability: Advantage Pownce. Twitter has been having problems lately and it’s trying people’s patience.

Accessibility: Advantage Twitter. Web, IM, Txt and local clients provide many options for getting connected.

Flexibility: Advantage Pownce. Videos, pictures, music, easy linking, and text sans the 140 character limit.

Friend Finding: Advantage Pownce. Both let you search by name, but Pownce has more options for importing from other services.

Tally

That’s 3 for Twitter and 3 for Pownce. OK, the numbers are misleading. Twitter wins, easily, if only because it’s what people are using right now.

In the end, it all boils down to what you want. If you want to share a variety of media types, you need Pownce. If you want more access options, Twitter is the way to go.

Personally, I’m still using Twitter most of the time, because that is where the action is. I also use Pownce on a daily basis and enjoy the different kinds of content that pops up there. If you into social networking and web 2.0, you should probably start using both.

Before long we’ll start seeing clients that aggregate both Pownce and Twitter, and by then there will be no reason not to enjoy the benefits of each.

-Jeff

Pownce Update

Over the last few days I’ve added most of my Twitter friends to Pownce and have about 25 people that I’m friends with (two way connection) and about 25 that I’m fans of (one way connection - either they haven’t bothered to log in and accept friends, or they don’t wish to follow me).

I have gotten updates from exactly 7 people. I have gotten private messages and replies to my posts. There have been a few general updates that I noticed across both Pownce and Twitter. The vast majority of the updates I’ve received have been from two “internet people”, tech news blogger and podcaster Cali and Mahalo guy Jason.

Most of the updates are small text messages (basic tweets) often with links and some but not all are shortened with TinyURL. One person posted an MP3 file and I posted an image just to try it out.

When clicking on the picture of one of your friends on the left side of the screen, you are shown their public updates, and all the public updates they receive. The most common thing I saw was this:

Which was the picture I posted over a day ago. Since I’m not the most prolific microblogger out there, this tells me that most people on my friends list aren’t exactly knocking themselves out using Pownce. Most of them have much smaller friends list than I do suggesting they haven’t imported friends from Twitter or another service.

I know it’s only been a few days, but Beta has been around for a while and Pownce certainly has been talked about for a good deal of time. I expect action to pick up slowly, but am a bit surprised that it hasn’t taken off quicker than it has.

I think the two main problems at this point are that Twitter has established the early lead as far as the messaging component goes. Where Pownce stands out it the ability to add other media such as files, MP3s, pictures etcetera. I get the impression that most users really haven’t figured out a way to productively use the added capabilities of Pownce.

One of my Twitter friends posted a link to her latest blog post, which was pretty bare bones, but at the bottom contained this image she was using for promotional purposes (there was a link provided as well).

What I’m wondering is: Why not stick this image in a Pownce post? Rather than just giving people a link to a page with the image on it, why not give them the image right up front in Pownce. I’m a very visual person and so using pictures and graphics is a good way to grab my attention.

Curiosity will still probably suck me into following your link, but placing an image up front grabs my attention and makes me take a closer look.

I think this is where the strength of Pownce will come in, but the people behind Pownce would be wise to get the word out there before other competitors start catching up. If they were able to better demonstrate how Pownce’s unique features can be better used, they might generate more of a buzz.

For straight text, quick updates, and TinyURLs, I like Twitter. I don’t see Pownce replacing Twitter, since Twitter has more experience under its belt, a much higher user base and much more more traffic.

If you would like to increase Pownce usage, and get more use out of it, start thinking outside the box a little. I know it often takes a momentous effort to get friends and clients just to warm up to new things like Twitter, and it won’t be easy, but I think there could be potential for the mutli-media microblog.

If you’re really connected to the Internet these days, you’ve probably got a Twitter account, a Flickr account and maybe you’ve even started using Seesmic or Utterz as well. Why not start putting some of that content up little by little on Pownce? Record a short MP3 message and post it. Put the latest picture of your nephew doing something silly up, whatever strikes you.

If you are promoting something, trying to get more traffic to your website, trying to get friends to join you for a night out or whatever, why not throw some multimedia advertising out there? The poster displayed above is a good example of something you could stick in a Pownce post. If you have any graphic talents, instead of just providing a link, how about a link and a logo? With a little thinking outside the box, or a slightly different approach, Pownce could be a cheap and easy way to get attention or at least add some flair to your microblogging.

Cheers,

Jeff

Pownce - A Quick Look

A few days ago Pownce went from closed beta to completely open. If you’re not familiar with it, Pownce is a social networking and microblogging site. It is found on the web at Pownce.com. There are a few similarities between Pownce and Twitter, and a few notable differences.

If you are completely unfamiliar with some of the concepts of social networking and services like Twitter and Pownce, I’ll give a quick rundown. The first thing you need is friends. Pownce lets you search for other uses by name, or you can quickly import your friends from places like Flickr, Digg, Facebook, Twitter, Gmail, Hotmail, AOL mail, and Yahoo mail. This will send out a friend request, allowing you to follow their public posts and if they accept your request, will allow them to follow you and allow you to see content designated for friends only.

Once you have a network of friends and fans (a fan is a one way friend, you’re following someone, but they aren’t following you), you are ready to start Powncing. You can post short messages, similar to a blog, and all of your friends and fans will be able to see what you’ve posted. Likewise, all of your friends latest updates will be displayed as well.

This is pretty similar to Twitter, allowing you to post random thoughts, updates on what you are doing at the moment or whatever strikes your fancy. Right now, it doesn’t look like there is support for IM integration or SMS integration, which for some is a big draw of Twitter.

What makes Pownce cool, and possibly more useful than Twitter, is the ability to share other types of media, such as pictures, videos, music and even files.

Here is a post with an MP3 file in it. You can listen right from the browser, or download to your computer.

Here’s an example of an attached file in a post

There are various other types of files and media that can be attached, and it looks like a great way to blog your favorite new music, pictures, videos or whatever else you are into.

Right now my circle of friends still relatively small and only about 1/4 of my Twitter pals are on Pownce at the moment. Many of those that do have accounts don’t seem to use them with as much frequency as they use Twitter. I think the number of people using Pownce and the frequency with which they use it will increase shortly, once people start seeing what you can do with the service. If the Mahalo Multisubmit extension takes off, we’re likely to see a lot more Pownce traffic as people submit their posts/tweets/pownces to multiple sites simultaneously.

I like Twitter for the rapid fire conversation and IM-like atmosphere, but Pownce has a great deal of potential for posts with a bit more depth to them, and looks like a great way to share things other than just text. It may even get me to start taking more photos and posting them online from time to time. I like the idea of sharing music (legal, free music of course) as one of my best sources of new music comes from friends.

Pownce is free to sign up for and there is also a pro account available for $20 per year, which gives you a bigger file upload size and a few other features. I’m currently using the free, basic account happily.

Check it out and let me know if you come up with other cool ways to use it. I’ll be adding my Pownce links and a button to my blog soon so feel free to check me out there and show off your stuff!

A Look at Twitter

I recently discovered Twitter and quickly developed a fascination with it. If you aren’t familiar with it, Twitter is a web application that lets you post 140 character updates to the web. You can follow other people’s updates and others can follow yours. You can update from the web, from a local application, from a cell phone, email, or IM.

After expanding your circle of followers and followees, it becomes apparent that Twitter is a bit of a close-knit community. It quickly became apparent to me that the people I was following were following each other, and their followers were following me and I was following them etc.

One person described twitter as being “incestuous” referring to the way everyone in this family follows each other. It’s an interesting phenomenon.

What people use Twitter for varies greatly. Some people do just update what they are doing at the moment, while others use it to direct people to their latest blog posts. Many people like posting random thoughts and commenting on the random thoughts of others. It also serves as a nice IM client, sending messages to all your friends and followers who happen to be online.

Twitter is frequently hampered by technical issues and often goes down for short periods of time. As things get ironed out, I can only see more and more people using the service and think it has enormous potential in the workplace (as more than just a time-waster).

-Jeff