Twitter is one of those social networking platforms that most people have a love/hate relationship with. Some can’t find the purpose for it, others think it’s just plain stupid, and many think it’s the best thing to come along in ages. Regardless of your stance on the medium, it IS a powerful tool for online communication, be it breaking news, passing along information to those who follow you, or simply keeping up with a company. Because of this there are countless Twitter clients out there, all begging for your attention.
So what does Twittelator for the iPad bring to the table?
I’ve been using Twittelator ($4.99) for the iPad for a while now and I have to admit the app is very well put together. When you open up Twittelator for iPad the first thing you should do is switch to landscape, as this app is easily best viewed outside of portrait mode. Once you have that done you will see the timeline of those you follow on the left side of the screen as well as tabbed options on the bottom. Whenever you click (or tap as it is) on a tweet or profile, Twittelator beautifully animates the option and brings up the information on the right side…leaving your timeline in full view.
I’ve spent most of my time with Twitter on the iPad using TweetDeck and Twitterific. Both great apps, but each has its downfalls. Specifically loading times. For some reason they load slowly, new tweets to the timeline seem to take forever in comparison to Twittelator and each are missing too many key features. For example, with Twittelator photos are embedded directly into your timeline, there is a drafts section for future tweets to wait their turn, users can change the background of the app, and can easily move from item to item, tweet to tweet, and from timeline to profile, or any other section needed. Twittelator supports many different URL shortening services, Instapaper and Read it Later, multiple accounts, channels to find useful tweets on a subject, keyword/location/people searching, access to your Twitter lists, access to the trending topics, and the “everyone” timeline. While you’re playing around with all those features, the best part is your timeline is STILL showing, on the left side, auto-refreshing, keeping you up to date.
My Changed Background
With all that you’d think I’d be done. You’re thinking there can’t be more. But there is. When you’re ready to post, once again Twittelator doesn’t disappoint. Users can add photos from their gallery to the Tweet. Can record audio to insert directly from the iPad app into a post, geotag or insert a map link, find a friend to @mention using a drop-down/search box, and even add icons/emoticons to a post. There is so much you can do it’s almost easy to miss that there is a “fail-safe” for sending your tweet. We’ve all accidentally hit send on a touch screen for one app or another. With Twittelator for iPad you have to slide the send button instead of just tapping it. It takes no more time, but adds the element of “safety” and “assurance” to your sending.
Is Twitterlator for iPad perfect? No, but it comes close! I’d love the ability to customize the toolbar at the bottom. I would much rather have “trends” on the main bar as opposed to in the MORE section. I have better use for them than say…Drafts (which I personally don’t use). By doing this I could also choose what my default on the “right side” of the screen is, as the timeline is already on the left. As it stands now my DM (Direct Messages) sit on the right by default, and I rarely use them…I’d love to change that to a List, or @Mentions. This is something that is available on Twittelator Pro for iPhone, I’d hope it gets brought over to iPad soon.
So should you sink your hard earned 5 bucks into Twittelator for iPad? If you want more options and something a bit unique in the world of Twitter apps, then yes, yes you should. But don’t just take my word for it, check out the video at the Twittelator website: http://stone.com/pad/twittelator/.
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