5 Twitter clients you might not know but you should use!

Quite a while since the last update but hey… I have the heat to blame… ! No, there is actually no excuse but things are going crazy here the last weeks. It is the surge of work just before I hit the beaches for the summer.

While WebOffspring was kind of low on updates, I always find the time, even if I’m on the go, to be active on Twitter. I post regularly, several times a day, 7days a week, about all the webish things you are looking for when coming here. And if you are not following me yet, why don’t you do it now –>? @WebOffspring.

When I’m on the go I usually use my phone to be in touch with the twitter world using either Twitter for iPhone or more often than not TweetDeck and lately Twitterrific, but when I sit on my pc I usually keep away from Twitter’s own web interface because lets admit it: it Sucks. So I thought I’d list 5 of my favorite Twitter clients to help you manage your tweet adventures.

Destroy Twitter

Destroy Twitter is, in my opinion, one of the best Twitter clients out there! It is based on Adobe Air but it feels smooth like a real desktop application. It sits in your program bar and notifies you of new tweets which you can read in an interface similar to an instant messenger while when maximized can show several columns (mentions, directed messages, lists) like other popular clients do.

Pros

– Conveniently used as an instant messenger

– Super fast and lightweight

– Twitpick integration, shows images without leaving the app

– Filters allows you to cut out the noise

Cons

– One account open at a time

– Only one dark theme available (others coming in the next version)

– Aims to destroy twitter (well Twitter’s web interface sucks anyway)

Shareminds Desktop

Shareminds is a desktop Twitter client for Windows that you can use to browse your tweets, examine user profiles, search tweets for keywords etc. Shareminds desktop has also an integrated web viewer, allows for filtering tweets, employs URL shortening and more. What I found annoying though is that even though it is a native Windows application (not air based) performance and overall responsiveness of the app wasn’t what I expected.

Pros

– Native desktop (Windows) Twitter client

– Searching, filtering available within the app

– Url shortening service

– Web viewer

Cons

– Performance could be better

– A little bit cluttered interface

– No new tweets notifications

Sobees

Sobees is an application that allows you to manage your social networks presence, Twitter included. It has a desktop (Windows), Web and Mobile (iPhone, iPad) version. It allows tweets search, status updates on multiple networks, multiple Twitter account management and customization options such as colors and language changes. The Desktop version is currently in Beta and has a few glitches, but I think it will get better eventually.

Pros

– Customizable

– Supports Twitter, Facebook, mySpace, LinkedIn

– Multiple Twitter account management

– Layouts allow to read multiple timelines in one view

Cons

– Desktop version could be faster

– Images open in a browser, no app image viewer

– Too much wasted screen real estate, important in small screens (netbook anyone?)

Spaz

Spaz is an open source Twitter client based on Adobe Air for the desktop version while there is a mobile version available, too. Spaz client is quite minimal which I think is a plus. It supports most of the basic Twitter functionality and although it needs a little bit of more work to be complete it is a nice little Twitter client, especially when you take into account it’s open source nature.

Pros

– Open source, change stuff like fonts and colors yourself by CSS editing

– Grid layout choice instead of the more standard list layout for tweets

– Tweet search functionality

Cons

– Customization requires some basic programming knowledge

– Not so intuitive interface, some features are hard to find

– No follow user functionality from within the app

TweetyBot

TweetyBot is a Windows based Twitter client which adds a set of very interesting features on top of the basic Twitter offered ones. First of all you can set it up so that you will only receive notifications of tweets of the users you choose, cutting out the noise. You can also select to automatically follow users that follow you or unfollow users you follow, if the don’t follow you back within a time frame you set. You can even send new followers a personalized welcome message.

If all the above where not enough, TweetyBot allows you to schedule tweets, create ignore lists for widely known spam accounts and create auto replies if specific keywords appear in your timeline.

Pros

– Native Windows desktop application

– Auto Replies, ignore lists, tweets scheduling, automatic follow and unfollow

– Automatic welcome message for new followers

– Notifications of updates from your own selected people cutting out the noise

Cons

– User interface, although not bad, could be better

– No visual customizations available, stuck with the default theme

– A little taller than it should for Netbook use, still functional though

.. And some more

– Blu
– Sesmic
– Twesh