7 Top Twitter Topic Trackers
For a service that simply takes 140 characters of input and then blasts them out in front of potentially hundreds of thousands of readers at a time, there has been a lot of work by people and businesses to figure out the best way to re-interpret and re-group Twitter posts in to meaningful categories, trends and threads.
Two common ways that have developed are link tracking and meme tracking. In the first case, it's fairly simple - just take all the URLs posted on Twitter, uncompress them if necessary, add up the uniques, and sort them by popularity. But today we are going to focus on the latter case, services that look for a specific keyword, topic, or hashtag (all falling under the fuzzy category of meme or viral idea) and cluster related tweets together.
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There are two types of topic trackers out there: List and waterfall. The first category (and first four on our list) are basically search engines for Twitter keywords, perhaps with a little extra thrown in. The second category is very much as it sounds - real-time Twitter results that flow down the screen like a waterfall.
Tweetizen
Tweetizen (sounds like citizen) is a relatively new discovery that was brought to my attention via a comment on my Tinker post. Tweetizen has a lot of power hidden behind its simple facade. There are two main types of groups that you can create, friends and interests. Friend groups are just that: friend groups. Add a bunch of your Twitter friends' nicknames here and generate an instant stream with just their updates. Very nice!
Interest groups are more complex, they are similar to, but more powerful (in some ways) than Tinker, which we covered here. You can start out by giving your new group a name, and then choose any combinations of keywords to search for. The real power here is anything you enter here gets passed directly through to the Twitter search API. So, if you want to search for #followfriday, but only see tweets including the word 'Saturday', use Saturday as your search term, and #followfriday as your tag term. Then, go to advanced options and select 'use all of these tags & text'. You can also remove keywords from your search results by putting a minus (-) in front of the term. As a demonstration, I constructed this simple group as an example: FollowFriday Saturday. I'll leave experimenting with other Twitter search terms (like from:) as an exercise for the reader to try.
Some other great features of Tweetizen are; the ability to embed groups on external web pages, using Twitter OAuth to be able to directly create or reply to tweets in a group you've made, a live refresh option, and extra filtering options to remove tweets without URLs and retweets.
Twitscoop
Twitscoop is a clever site that shows a constantly-updating cloud of popular terms (although not necessarily hashtags) that you can click on to get some more details. You can also grab a widget that creates a new cloud every time it is refreshed. Finally, there is trend tracking that gives you a constantly-refreshing list based on username, tag or keyword, plus a little graph on the popularity of the search term over time. An expanded view of search results is also available, like this one.
TweetChannel
TweetChannel is a very clean site that is similar to Tinker in that it attempts to link a user's login with certain hashtag topics. In order to create your own channel, you must provide your Twitter login and password, which causes you to automatically start following a Twitter user @tweet_channel. This is the listener account for the service. Once logged in, you can create your own hashtag-based channel and any subsequent tweets you send out with that hashtag will show up in TweetChannel, under that channel. You can then grab an RSS feed of anything from that channel (or any other channel registered in the service). For example, you can check out the #sandbox channel.
Tweetscan
Tweetscan is the only application in this round-up with a subscription fee. But after we tell you some of its features, you may find subscribing worthwhile. Its unassuming front page offers a trending topic cloud that you can click on to bring up a quick search result, or you can use the search bar. Once search results are up, you will notice some unusual refinements; first is choice of service! Yes, Tweetscan supports identi.ca. You can also narrow results by user, and grab an RSS feed of any search, even tweet your custom search link. Example #followfriday search here.
Additionally, Tweetscan offers the paying customer the ability to download any search result as a CSV (comma separated value) file, suitable for import into a spreadsheet or database application, as well as sending regular search result updates via email. Also, Tweetscan has a separate portal specifically for searching user profiles! We are actually fairly impressed with this tool, it is trying to bring more to the table in exchange for a small subscription fee.
Twistori
Twistori (not to be confused with Twistory, which lets you add tweets to a calendar) is one of the original Twitter meme waterfalls. It is based on an infographic art project by Jonathan Harris called We Feel Fine, and its mission is very straightforward: You can choose from 6 verbs that show up quite commonly on Twitter, and once chosen, you get a reverse waterfall highlighting recent, anonymous tweets containing a personal use of that verb. Very zen and relaxing, but more art that function.
Extra features include a mac screensaver version and a custom mac application.
Twitterfall
Twitterfall is basically where twitterers go after they watch Twistori for a while and want a tool they can use to make their own custom waterfalls. Twitterfall supports searching for keywords and hashtags, and will support additional search parameters like the minus to exclude terms (mentioned above) and the from: operator to limit tweets from a single account. You can see my FollowFriday Saturday example here.
All the parameters for your waterfall experience are adjustable, from the background color theme to the appearance speed of new tweets. You can log in via Twitter OAuth (although that didn't work for me, it falls back to a traditional login prompt) in order to perform operations on tweets in the waterfall, such as replying and retweeting. The waterfall helpfully pauses if you hover over a tweet. You can limit search results to a specific geographic region.
There are also widgets for the Mac and Windows desktop but no javascript embed or RSS output, which is unfortunate. Although, you can save your custom searches if you log in.
Monitter
Monitter takes the Twitterfall concept a step further by giving you not one but three fully-customizable keyword search waterfalls that are constantly updated with recent tweets. Each search, like with Tweetizen and Twitterfall, is passed directly to the search API so you can add advanced parameters to fine-tune your results. There is also support for regional tweets, although it looks like imposing a region affects every column, which may be overkill.
Monitter pipes Twitter search results directly back out into the columns in a waterfall format. Oddly, the RSS icons link directly to Twitter search query results. Also, there doesn't seem to be any way of sharing columns with other people. I did discover though that apparently the session is saved in a cookie so, you can feel safe leaving the page and returning to it later.
Extras include the ability to add or remove columns and a customizable jquery widget that, with a bit of PHP programming skill, you can add to your blog's web page.
A final note we would like to mention about Monitter: It seems to like Chrome a lot more than Firefox. It may just be my setup, but as a warning, your mileage may vary.
Honorable Mentions
There are a number of very similar web apps, which I am calling "Twitter search front-ends," that all replicate the same functionality in slightly different ways:
- Twendz: Created by marketing firm Waggener Edstrom, Twendz is just a nice, clean Twitter search utility that supports a waterfall result and advanced search term constructions. Here is an example Followfriday search.
- Tweetzi: No affiliation or creator name attached to this search, but it has the distinction of using the biggest Courier font we've ever seen plus the ability to filter by mood. Good stuff. Example search here.
- Twemes: Twemes is one of the few web sites we looked at that doesn't seem to use the Twitter search API directly. Unfortunately, as a result it is extremely slow on certain searches. It does have a couple of unusual features but the interface and responsiveness get in the way of this being a useful tool.
Finally, we would like to give a shout out to Birdsall's Massive Twitter Sites & Tools Directory page that made finding these apps much less of a chore than it could have been.
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I am surprised that you didn't even mention the twitter's native search.
It is much powerful and FAST
Thanks for the review on Tweetizen! Appreciate the positive feedback, we'll beat Tinker out... even without the PR money :-)
Gotta love how Twitter keeps us up to date on current issues. I am surprised the Obama on the Dollar stuff isn't on there yet; I give it two weeks. They just started and they are getting a ton of traffic.
http://www.obamaonthedollar.com
I would say something possitive if they had not cancelled our account
You have to leve twitter
Nice roundup, Phil. Another one you should really check out is MicroPlaza (www.microplaza.com) ... I really like what they're doing.
One of the last things I did as a blogger was review MicroPlaza. :) (So this might be helpful: http://www.sitepoint.com/blogs/2009/02/24/microplaza-solves-twitter-link-sharing/ ).
Josh, I'll have to re-visit Microplaza. It looked awesome but I just wasn't grasping the concept the last time I tried to use it. Thanks for the write-up as well.
Note that I focused solely on topic tracking tools, with that in mind would you put Microplaza in the group?
Don't count out established niche aggregators that publish feeds of prescreened/high-quality content. Read: no spam.
http://www.thevelvethottub.com/
http://newte.ch/
http://mds.powerscroll.com
etc.
Well, as far as I know, the way MicroPlaza works is that it looks at how often links are being tweeted and retweeted to expose memes with weight given to the people you're following (so it bubbles up stuff in your network since that's the stuff you should theoretically be most interested in).
The focus on links over topics (which I take it to mean are textual bits?) maybe makes it a bit off for this list... but it definitely still tracks what's trending on Twitter, imhp, just with special attention paid to what the people you're most interested in are talking about.
You should definitely take a closer look. I think the RWW audience would really be into it (I know were I still writing for RWW, I'd definitely have covered it here :D).
I love how Tweetdeck has Twitscoop built in. there's nothing cooler than seeing trending news... I found out that my favorite football player, Brett Favre had retired, followed the entire hudson river plane crash... can you imagine 9-11--that might have crashed twitter.
Twitter is like a breath of fresh air on the Social Media scene. I have been on it for just a few weeks now and I have met several interesting people. It is a platform to network with people you would like to meet in real life. Check me out!!
http://twitter.com/spryka
My Twitter Trend Trackers are:
1) Twitter Search
2) TweetDeck - By far the best. I use the columns to set up key word searchers
3) Tweetlater - Google Alert like emails around key words I care about
4) Yahoo's Sideline - a new Adobe AIR app for twitter search.
Shaun Dakin
CEO and Founder
The National Political Do Not Contact Registry
A Mashable Open Web Award winner
@EndTheRobocalls
@IsCool
@AskThePresident
Thanks for the tools ... use Tweeddeck and Twitter search myself.
Hi Shaun and Steen - if you use tweetdeck and twitter search, then you've got to try tweetizen (http://www.tweetizen.com) - i developed that because I was a heavy twitter search and tweetdeck user myself and wanted something where I get the best of both worlds in 1 place.
Let me know how it goes.
Thanks for the mention of twendz!
Not sure if you noticed this on your visit, but twendz doesn't just do monitoring, but it also does real-time automated sentiment analysis.
This means you can quickly see the moods and attitudes of tweets (sentiment), not just the tweetstream. Green is positive, Red negative.
Thanks for the mention of twendz!
Not sure if you noticed this on your visit, but twendz doesn't just do monitoring, but it also does real-time automated sentiment analysis.
This means you can quickly see the moods and attitudes of tweets (sentiment), not just the tweetstream. Green is positive, Red negative.
Why must every new site contain the feedback widget on the side by uservoice? It has already turned into a cliche.
I like tweetgrid for twitter tracking. I was actually coding the same thing when I clicked on a link and it was alread there. So part 1 of my app is dead. On to part 2. :-)
Another app I love is Feedinshort for getting your feeds in Twitter. Subscribe to RSS/ATOM and read them in Twitter http://tinyurl.com/chafya
Never quite understood why these things always leave out twitterspy: http://dustin.github.com/twitterspy/
It's been tracking stuff for people on twitter for nearly a year now via IM -- and who doesn't have an IM client running?
Posted by: dustin [bleu.west.spy.net]
|
April 5, 2009 9:15 PM
Another vote for using TweetDeck with its inbuilt Twitscoop and then adding search columns on specific keywords.
Other resources to offer improvements are always good to read about, but I am trying to move away from a situation where effective use of Twitter requires me using 10 different websites...
Ian Hendry
CEO, WeCanDo.BIZ
http://www.wecando.biz
I've just been pointed to Tweetchat - which lets you go to a "room" (specified by a #tag).
From there, it auto-refreshes (by default, every 10 seconds); you can "block"/"promote" particular posters & post from within (with the #tag already appended) - so no need to return to a diff app/webpage to post.
Am v. impressed so far! (Was recommended to me by @mbogle)
So, people believe the potential of instant news via Twitter can be filtered for one's good use. We've our own home grown Twitter Tracker but specific to our realm - http://ocricket.com/talk/
I personally use TweetLater keyword alerts to track keywords.
You can add Twielsen http://twielsen.com to the mix. It tracks and rates TV shows in real time based on Twitter chatter.
I am not able to find any tool to know top searched keywords in twitter. Please anyone any idea?
http://twitteverest.webmania.cc is also a good tool for this
There are two different types of topic tracking: 1. tracking known topics; 2. auto-discovering previously unknown topics. Most people are probably talking about the first type. I just like to add that the second is more difficult and usually requires NLP and/or semantic analysis. My free website http://web2express.org is focused on auto-discovery of new hot topics in real time conversation with NLP/semantic technology.
In addition, user can create any topic to follow. By adding of a set of keywords or phrases to the topic, you will find that following by topic ensures a more complete view of conversations from twitter. When you tweet or retweet about a topic, the topic’s hashtag is automatically appended to your message so that you don’t need to remember what hashtag to use.
Individuals will find it handy for keep tracking of interests. Companies may use it to effectively monitor conversations concerning their products, brands or competitors.
There are two types of topic trackers out there: List and waterfall. The first category (and first four on our list) are basically search engines for Twitter keywords, perhaps with a little extra thrown in. The second category is very much as it sounds - real-time Twitter results that flow down the screen like a waterfall.
How do I keep tracks of popular keywords?