Online Social Media Tools I use on the iPhone
(Photo taken with my iPhone)
I broke down and bought the iPhone a week ago for a number of reasons, but the main reason was for its online social media capabilities. The tools that I use regularly include Twitter, Wordpress, Facebook, and MySpace. For the last few weeks, I have also been text-messaging (SMS) quite a bit. Here are the free online social media-related iPhone applications that I use:
Twitfire (a Twitter application): Of all my online social media-related iPhone applications, I use Twitfire the most. I tried out Twitterific before I tried Twitfire, and based on my experience, Twitfire is much more stable. Using Twitfire, I am able to quickly send tweets containing my current location, post photos (either from library or taken at time of posting), and do “@” replies. Utilizing all of these features is quite intuitive, though the usability is a bit clunky. For example, the posting of photos takes a few minutes, and the “@” address book doesn’t have all of my contacts listed. Twitfire has a built-in web browser that converts links into shortened links and allows me to easily place them into tweets. One HUGE downside to Twitfire is that you cannot read others’ tweets. To phrase that last sentence differently, Twitfire is used ONLY for posting tweets and NEVER for reading tweets. (Video review)
Twitteriffic is much more robust than Twitfire, but it hasn’t been very reliable, in my experience. That is, it doesn’t load up half the time when I open it. This is frustrating. That said, when it does work, Twitteriffic is a fantastic product that does everything Twitfire does and MORE! In addition to being able to post photos, geolocation, and tweets, Twitteriffic has a great interface for viewing and replying to tweets. To summarize, if you can get Twitteriffic to work consistently, it is a much better product than Twitfire.
Wordpress for iPhone is simply fantastic. If you use either self-hosted Wordpress or Wordpress.com software for your blog or website, then you will love this application. The current version allows you to manage and publish posts with photos and hyperlinks. The next version has promised expanded functionality including horizontal keyboard, posting in the future, managing comments, and managing pages. Unfortunately, the nature of the keyboard makes it difficult to type as quick as I am used to on my home keyboard, which makes posting long posts such as this one difficult to stomach.
Facebook for iPhone is FANtastic! From the iPhone home screen, this application’s button has a slick, little icon that tells me how many new messages are in my Facebook in-box in much the same way that my “Mail” button does. The application has interfaces for my “News Feed”, “Notifications”, “Requests”, “Friends”, “Chat”, and “Inbox”. I am able to view photos and respond to comments and status updates. I am also able to write and post photos on friends’ walls.
MySpace for iPhone allows me to manage my status, view and comment on friends’ pages, view and post photos, check and send email, and view friend requests.
Some other tools that I use regularly are the Twitter SMS functionality and Flickr email functionality. Both of these tools allow me to send photos to Twitter and Flickr, respectively, from the photo management interface on the iPhone.
