Spinning the Web

Do you know your Tweetbeep from your Twanslate?

I love Twitter. Fact. That might, in some eyes (okay – most eyes) make me appear a geek. It wasn’t always that way.

There was a time when I used to regard Twitter with confusion and disdain in equal measure – my impression of the serial tweeter was pretty close to that of the gloriously hideous Twitter Whore.

However, I am most definitely a changed man. In recent times Twitter has become an essential professional tool – connecting me with a knowledge base that literally spans the world.

I also love the fact Twitter has become defined by its users – with many tweeters using the Twitter API to create new and exceptionally useful little tools and Web 2.0 widgets.

Here my soon-to-be Twitter addicts. Here.

You can see my own tweets to the right, or, as Hitler, the Pied Piper and the Moonies have been known to say – “follow me“

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ALbH63Ali9U&hl=en&fs=1&rel=0&color1=0xe1600f&color2=0xfebd01]

^Twitter Whore: the traditional Tweeter caricature

It’s been around for a while but Dipity 2.0 is like, well, like your life flashing before you. Aside from providing a wealth of benefits when mapping projects, the combination with Daylife provides an exceptional tool to review news content around a specific issue according to time and date.

The timeline is, for me, by far the most useful visualisation but the Google Maps mashup adds another dimension of insight.

Below (as an example) is my current timeline bringing feeds from both my professional and personal life – quite scary for me, quite dull for you. These can be embedded in any blog or website, but also within Netvibes or other AJAX dashboard.

Okay – update… since moving from Blogger to Wordpress I can’t embed the Dipity widget. Meh. But click here to see it in fullscreen glory. Here’s a quick screengrab to show you how it looks: