The latest from TechCrunch
- Twitter Just Killed Something Else: Their Own Website. Twitter For iPad Is That Good.
- The iTunes Ping Social Question: Follow, Friend, Or Lurk?
- Preview: Apple's Ping Music Social Network In Action On iOS [Pictures]
| Twitter Just Killed Something Else: Their Own Website. Twitter For iPad Is That Good. | Top |
| Are you addicted to Twitter? Do you have an iPad? Even if the answer to both is “no” right now, after you see Twitter for iPad, those answers are going to change — quickly. Yes, the wait is over. Launching tonight in the App Store is Twitter for iPad — the first official native iPad app from the company. We all knew it was coming (Twitter even said so a few months ago), but it has been a long wait. It was definitely worth it. Like most people, I wander into hyperbole from time to time. But it has now been a few days since I first played with Twitter for iPad, and I still think it is hands-down the best iPad app out there. It’s that good. With all due respect to Reeder, Instapaper, Flipboard, and Pulse, this is now going to be my go-to app for just about everything related to reading news. It’s simply such a great experience for reading tweets — and more importantly, reading the links your friends share. What Twitter (and developer Loren Brichter specifically) has done is create an amazing user experience for reading information. This is thanks to an intuitive user interface that layers on top of itself. So, for example, if I click on a link in my tweet stream, I’ll have a new layer that rolls over to show that webpage in a customized browser window. If you’ve used Flipboard, it’s somewhat similar, but better because it’s much easier to go back to where ever you previously were before you clicked the link. You simply swipe something to the side to move it temporarily or swipe it again to get it off the screen (in portrait mode anyway, where there’s less space). Something else that’s awesome: when you highlight a tweet by clicking on it, it’s now pinned to the top or bottom of the screen as you scroll through your stream. This is great if it’s something you want to reference. A lot of thought has been put into these type of saving state actions within this app. It’s simple to save a draft and go back to it, for example (much easier than with Twitter for iPhone). Or to reference one of these pinned tweets in your own tweet. There are also some great new gestures that Twitter came up with for this app. For example, if you pinch-outward on a tweet, it will unfold to show you more information about the Twitter user. Better may be the way you can swipe down with two fingers on any tweet to see a full conversation in context. It’s the little things like this that make the app great — Apple-like, even. Overall, the app looks and feels quite a bit different from Twitter for iPhone (which Twitter built from Tweetie — Brichter’s client that they acquired earlier this year). But Twitter’s Leland Rechis assures me it’s using all the same stuff on the backend. In fact, Twitter is now a universal app — meaning it’s one app that will work on both the iPhone and iPad, it will just look different depending on which device you’re using it on. Rechis also says Twitter started experimenting with some newer things on the iPad version that haven’t yet been brought to the iPhone version, but undoubtedly will. A great example here is that when you click through to a user’s profile page, you’ll see at the bottom a list of users similar to that user that you may like to follow. Rechis also notes the importance of the logged-out view — something Twitter worked on before the iPhone version launch. Twitter wants to make the service as useful as possible to people even if they don’t have an account. The idea, of course, is that they’ll hopefully sign up for one — and this app may give them the most reason to yet. When logged out, you’ll be able to see tweet streams based on hot topics. “ Tweets in general are not just what I’m doing, they have an incredible amount of metadata ,” Rechis says speaking to why they created this layering idea for the app. Almost 25 percent of all tweets now have a link in them, he says. This app is perfect for those tweets, and content consumption and exploration in general. Rechis notes that one of his favorite things about tablets is how they eliminate window management. At the same time, you need some way to manage all this information. He notes that Brichter’s original concept was stacks of sheets of paper that you quickly shuffle through. Other members of Twitter including Rechis refined that idea and the end result is Twitter for iPad. That’s roughly 750 words about the app — but you really just need to see it, and use it. It will definitely be my go-to way to browse Twitter from now on. It’s that good. Look for it in the App Store shortly. It will be a free download. | |
| The iTunes Ping Social Question: Follow, Friend, Or Lurk? | Top |
| Right now, many of you are likely downloading iTunes 10 , the latest version of Apple’s media software. The most notable feature in this new version is Ping, Apple’s first stab at building a music social network (or really any kind of social network). It’s interesting on a number of levels, but even the most basic level is pretty interesting: Ping’s social graph. First of all, to use Ping at all you have to opt-in to it. While Apple CEO Steve Jobs touted the 160 million built-in users (it’s currently available in iTunes in 23 countries), that’s a bit misleading because many people won’t opt-in to using it — many of them for no other reason than they’re lazy or just don’t care. But assuming you do opt-in to it, the next social layer is interesting as well. Immediately, you’re taken to a Privacy Settings page where Apple asks you how you’d like to use the service. This is where you decide if you want to use the friend model, the follow model, or the lurk model. To be more clear, Apple asks you to decide between two things: do you want to allow people to follow you, or do you want no one to be able to follow you? The latter is a nice option because you can still use Ping, you simply use it as a lurker. You can see what other people with public profiles are doing, but they can’t see what you are doing. The other option is to let people follow you — but there’s a sub option to this. You can either let anyone follow you (think: Twitter) or you can get notifications to approve everyone who wants to follow you (think: Facebook). Leave it to Apple to come up with a social graph dynamic that is fairly complicated but made to seem simple. I mean, this is almost the opposite of many of Facebook’s convoluted social rules. My argument recently has been that Facebook should have a simplified option to allow you to have both friends and followers — you know, like what Apple is doing here. Instead, everyone on Facebook is a friend or they’re some sub-list quasi-friend that you really hate but are connected with anyway. Or something. Or you can make a Page — which creates double the work for you and those people who also happen to be friends and followers. It’s just so ugh. I didn’t even consider this lurker option for Facebook because quite frankly, it would freak out a lot of people. But Apple does this smartly as well. While you’re free to roam and and see other public updates, if you do want to post something like a comment, your identity is shown. So no, there will be no anonymous trolling. I haven’t used Ping enough to tell if it will actually be useful. Given that this is Apple’s first real foray into social, it wouldn’t be a huge surprise. But they’ve won the first battle: simple privacy settings. Facebook could learn a thing or two from this. CrunchBase Information Apple iTunes Facebook Information provided by CrunchBase | |
| Preview: Apple's Ping Music Social Network In Action On iOS [Pictures] | Top |
| One of the big announcements at Apple’s event today was Ping , the music social network that Apple has baked into iTunes. But it’s not just on iTunes for the computer, it’s also a part of iTunes on the iPhone and iPod touch. This will be a part of the new iOS 4.1 release which is going out to developers right now, and should be out for consumers next week. In the demo area after the event, Apple had a bunch of iPod touches loaded with iOS 4.1, so we got to play around with it. It’s a pretty slick experience on the device because it’s so simple. Below find some pictures of how it works. Update : It looks like Apple magically rolled out Ping on iOS iTunes without any update needed! Disregard the part about iOS 4.1 — it’s simply any iOS 4 device. As you can see, Ping is the new middle button on the iTunes app itself. The main screen that loads when you click on it is the Activity stream, which is populated with music choice updates from the people you follow (both friends and artists). This account happens to follow 27 people. Only artists are shown here, but again, this People tab includes both artists and your friends. Here’s a page for an artist showing their most recent activity on Ping. Arists can upload pictures (such as from tours) and videos to this feed. Obviously, there is the nice one-click purchase of music. You can “Like” or “Comment” on any item in this feed. The “My Profile” tab is obviously the profile tied to this account (in this case, one Erin Steed). She has 0 followers (sad), but it’s not clear if that’s her own choice — Ping has settings so you can can be followed by anyone, have to accept followers, or be followed by no one. Fairly standard looking comment page — almost Facebook-like (the iPhone version). Here’s the one-click-to-buy option in the stream. You can also stream music previews (only 30 seconds still). Here’s a regular old album page on iTunes — but as you can see there is now the Like and Post button below the main info. Here’s what comes up when you click on post (a place to comment if you choose). And here’s what happens when you post — it goes right over to your profile (and in your followers’ streams). Obviously, all of this info syncs with iTunes on the computer and vice versa. CrunchBase Information Apple iTunes Information provided by CrunchBase | |
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