Birdfeed [$2.99 - iTunes link], one of the best looking, slickest working iPhone Twitter clients we’ve looked at, has just been updated to version 1.2 and is jam-packed with new, well-handled features:

• Geographic locations can now be attached to posted tweets using Twitter’s new Geo API, and a tweet’s location, if present, will now be displayed as a place name (e.g. “Metropolitan Avenue, Brooklyn, New York”) in the tweet detail view. Tweet locations can also be examined in a new map view.
• Flickr accounts can now be used as photo sharing services for
• New photo posting sheet allows larger versions of photos to be examined before they are posted, and for metadata (such as title, description, and tags) to be entered.
• Settings for location posting, photo sharing, and URL shortening are now located inside the app, and can be specified on a per-account basis. Additionally, the local tweet cache can be cleared for each account from its settings screen.
• The Direct Messages Inbox now has a toolbar with refresh and mark all read buttons.
• Mentions can now be marked as read simply by tapping into their detail view from the main timeline.
• Favstar.fm and Tweeteorites have been added to the profile services menu.

How’s 1.2 holding up so far? Birdfeed implements the Geo API flawlessly, though it takes a while for the location to manifest (I got near Quebec the first time I tapped it, then a nearby cross-street when I tapped it again — which is kind of creepy in a cyber-stalked sort of way).

If you’ve given it a try, let us know what you think.

This is a story by the iPhone Blog. This feed is sponsored by The iPhone Blog Store.

Birdfeed Twitter Client for iPhone Goes 1.2

Why is it easier to make a great Twitter client for Apple’s iPhone than for Google Android phones like the new Verizon DROID? After Robert Scoble wrote a typically impassioned post entitled The Droid fails AS A PRODUCT when compared to Palm Pre and iPhone, and used Twitter clients as an example, Thomas Marban of Android’s premiere Twitter client, Twidroid, responded:

one of the main reasons why UIs are unequally inferior are not only the way you build apps (open vs. closed hw/sw system) and the SDK itself but also marginal to non-existing UI standards, no ready-made drag & drop UI items, variations in carrier- & device firmware, hard- & software input, screen sizes, international customizations, modded phones, rooted phones and last but not least completely different expectations among users and the linux’ish target group itself. in a nutshell: beautiful mess. obviously, all these reasons eat up a huge pile of time that one could better spend with improving UX and polishing the interface. those who started early with android development have learned and are still learning it the hard way, just like they did with win 3.1 back in the days.

John Gruber of Daring Fireball, in Lots of Excuses comments:

That doesn’t sound like someone who plans to ever ship something of the caliber of Tweetie, Birdfeed, or Twitterrific. From what I’ve seen of Twidroid, it’s not even as good as Craig Hockenberry’s original version of Twitterrific for iPhone, which was written as a jailbreak app before the iPhone officially supported third-party software. If Android hardware diversity is already a problem for third-party developers, it’s only going to get worse.

This also highlights the advantages Apple has given iPhone developers. Not only is the iPhone based on OS X, but the development tools are based on Xcode and Interface Builder, and while not as many developers are likely already familiar with Cocoa touch as, say, developers might be with Android’s language(s) (or web developers may be for the Palm Pre), existing Mac developers can make those tools sing. And, given the SDK Apple provided, even new developers get a huge head start in terms of functions and user interface elements.

Sure, that means there’s a lower barrier of entry to creating poor iPhone apps, but it also means great developers aren’t wasting their time re-inventing UI wheels, or fighting the OS to do right by their apps. They investing that time in making great apps.

This is a story by the iPhone Blog. This feed is sponsored by The iPhone Blog Store.

Why It’s Easier to Make a Great Twitter Client for iPhone than for Android

TwitBit 2.0 Forum Review by llofte. For more Forum Reviews, see the TiPb iPhone App Store Forum Review Index!

Surprisingly, nearly 3 months after iPhone 3.0’s release, there are only a few twitter applications that offer push notifications. Twitbit is one of them. Version 1.x wasn’t compelling enough for me to use as my primary client, but the latest 2.0 update is rather impressive and brings Twitbit up to par with other great Twitter clients. The design is clean and simple yet not lacking in important features.

The home tab displays both your timeline and mentions. Just select which you want to view from the top. To scroll up to the most recent tweet, tap the time in the iPhone’s toolbar. Tapping on a tweet opens a new screen with the Tweeter’s name and username, the tweet, and some options. The tweet is displayed in a chat bubble below the user and includes the date/time and what platform the tweeter posted with. If the tweet was a reply, “In reply to…” will be attached to the tweet and tapping this will bring up a nice conversation view (direct messages also have conversation view). The tweet screen also includes buttons to reply, DM, retweet, and mark as favorite. Tapping the forward icon in the upper right corner allows you to open the tweet with the built in browser or mail a link to that tweet.

As you navigate through screens, the button on the top left will be named after your previous screen. If you find yourself several screens deep through navigation, tap the home tab to quickly return to your timeline.

A user’s profile screen includes the standard profile information including the options to follow/stop following, block, and bookmark. You can also send a user a public or direct message and view tweets that mention them from their profile. When viewing your own tweets from your user profile, there is an option to delete.

The Search tab is where you go to search for tweets in all of Twitter or by tweets near you. You can save any search term to for quick access later. To search trends, tap the bookmarks icon and select the trends tab at the bottom. From the top you can select current, daily, or weekly trends.

Search for users in the People tab as well as find all the users you have bookmarked and recent profiles you have visited. Your own profile will be listed on the top of the bookmarks list in blue. You can easily rearrange the list order by tapping edit.

Twitbit supports the use of multiple accounts and the account tab is where you go to switch between users. Tap the arrow for an account to set your push notification settings and edit your services. Twitbit allows you to post pictures to TwitPic, Yfrog, and Flickr and videos (3GS only) to TwitVid, Yfrog and Flickr all of which need to be authorized separately. If you have an Instapaper account, you can authorize it to use with Twitbit as well.

For even more settings, visit the iPhone’s Settings app and tap Twitbit. From here you can choose to display full names or usernames, how many tweets to fetch (20, 50, or 100), whether to highlight new tweets, and whether to scroll to the top when loading new tweets. Retweets can be formatted as “… (via @name)” or “RT @name: …”, image upload quality set as low, medium, or high, and nearby search radius as 2 km, 10 km, 50 km, or 250 km. If you don’t want your links to be shortened, you can turn that off too.

Twitbit is great application, but does has some disadvantages. There isn’t a way to access a list of users when composing a tweet, Flickr uploads do not include EXIF data, and the push notification sound is Apple’s default Tri-tone text message sound. The good news is that the developers have let us know they are considering adding these features in an upcoming release.

Speaking of the developers, High Order Bit is already diligently working on 2.1 promising features like full landscape support and the ability to iterate through your timeline from the tweet view. They are also planning to utilize those Twitter API updates for native retweet and geotag support.

Conclusion

Twitbit 2.0 is an excellent Twitter client! Notifications are quickly pushed to your iPhone in under 2 minutes, the UI is clutter free, and performance is smooth and snappy. If you’re looking for a Twitter application with built-in push notifications, I highly recommend Twitbit. If you’re unsure about making a purchase, you can try before you buy! Twitbit Lite is available for free and has all the features of Twitbit “pro” except for push and Flickr uploads. If you do choose to download Twitbit, be sure to let us know what you think!

Pros

• Push Notifications for mentions and direction messages in under 2 minutes
• Upload to Flickr
• Built-in browser and map
• Bookmark users

Cons

• No access to users while composing tweet
• Flickr uploads do not include EXIF data
• Only one notification sound option

TiPb Review Rating

This is a story by the iPhone Blog. This feed is sponsored by The iPhone Blog Store.

App Review: TwiBit 2.0 Twitter Client for iPhone

Tweetie 2.0 [$2.99 - iTunes link] is the second generation release of one of the iPhone’s most popular Twitter clients. According to developer Atebits, it’s also a ground-up re-write — it even has a snazzy new gray, single, cut-out bubble icon to prove it — the only thing 2.0 having in common with 1.0 being the name. I’d argue that point — they’re also both darn good Twitter clients, and they both share a price of $2.99.

That’s right. Since Apple doesn’t (yet?) provide a mechanism for upgrades (which to many developers means incentive and to many users means discount), and since in-app purchase can only add content, not replace an entire app, Atebits is packaging Tweetie 2.0 as a whole new app. And they’re charging the same price. In other words, whether you bought the first Tweetie or not, you’ll have to buy Tweetie 2.0.

Is it worth it? Let’s take a look…

Add Account

There’s pervasive landscape mode, so rotate between portrait and landscape as the mood strikes you. Once you’ve decided on your orientation of choice, you need to add an account, and Tweetie 2.0 supports multiple accounts, of course. There’s also a cog icon for Advanced options, where you can enter an API Root and Search API for Twitter proxy servers (if Twitter.com is not directly available to you).

Not something many users will likely have the need for, but great, specialized option.

Accounts

From the Accounts screen, you can select which account you want to access (if you have multi accounts set up), with Edit, Add, Settings, and Refresh buttons in the corners.

Settings lets you toggle Display Name between username and full name, Date Format between Relative and Absolute, and Font Size from anything between 13pt and 20pt.

Yes, Tweetie 2.0 has done the un-Apple and placed settings in the app, and not in Apple’s Settings app. We’ll leave the in-vs-out, settings-vs-preferences debate out of this walkthrough, just know where to go if you need to make changes.

You can choose your preferred Image Service from yFrog, TwitPic, TweetPhoto, Mobypicture, Twitgoo, Posterous, or img.ly, or set a custom option (by setting the image service API endpoint). Video Service options (for iPhone 3GS users) include yFrog and TwitVid. URL Shortening options include j.mp (bit.ly), TinyURL, is.gd, i.pr, u.nu, or Linkyy, or again, a Custom option. Read Later offers Instapaper or Read it later support.

Advanced Setting offer a host of additional configurations. Quote Syntax can be set to “…” -@user or “…” (via @user). Auto Rotate (the ability to rotate between portrait or landscape modes discussed above) options include Always, Compose Screen Only, or Never (would that Apple offered this system-wide on the iPhone!).

Enable TextExpander can be toggled between on and off, as can sound effects.

User Services can likewise be toggle for Tweet Blocker, Follow Cost, Favstar.fm, Favrd, and Tweeteorites.

API Keys are available for jmp login and key, and for Tagal.us.

There’s also an Install Safari Bookmarklet, which creates a browser link that you can use to send URLs from the Mobile Safari browser to Tweetie 2.0. (A webpage with full, step by step instructions show you how to set it up). It’s not as necessary post cut-and-paste in iPhone 3.x, but it’s handy.

All in all, an amazing array of choices and enough configurability to make a settings junkie very, very happy.

Timeline

Once you’ve chosen your account, Tweetie 2.0 takes you to your timeline, presented as a fairly standard list view of the tweets of all the people you follow. It’s also the first tab along the bottom of the app, represented by a word bubble which gets brighter, and gets a little triangular pointer on top, when active. Also, if you have any unread tweets, a small glowing dot will appear beneath the icon, much like how the Dock in Mac OS X Leopard and Snow Leopard denote active apps. These indicators are consistent for @Mentions and Direct Messages as well.

Just like Apple’s Spotlight enabled apps, you can scroll up to reveal a search box. In timeline view, typing in the search box filters the contents of the tweets (i.e. typing in iPhone results in only tweets containing the word “iPhone” to show up).

Instead of a Tweetie 1.x-style refresh button at the top of the list view, Tweetie 2.0 uses something more fun, if less iPhone-like. Pull down even further, past the Spotlight box, and you get a downward arrow that tells you to keep pulling if you want to refresh. Keep pulling and then, spring-like, the arrow flips up and the text changes, instructing you to release to refresh. Boom. New tweets.

Like Tweetie 1.x, swipe a tweet and you slide it away to get quick access to several options: deal with links in tweets (which gives you additional options like Open, Mail Link, Repost Link, and Read Later), go to user’s profile, star tweet, and perform an action (like Retweet, Quote Tweet, Post Link to Tweet, Mail Tweet, and Translate).

Tapping on a tweet takes you to a view of only that tweet which includes information like full name and username, which client was used to post the tweet, and surfaced buttons offering the same options as the swipe detailed above. There are also up and down triangle arrows, like you get in Mail, so you can go to the next or previous tweet, saving you having to hit the Timeline (back) button, and essentially letting you browse in single tweet mode if you like.

Tapping on the avatar/name bar brings you to the user’s profile which adds in the Twitter user number (order in which you joined Twitter — i.e. @biz and @ev are early joiners and so have low numbers, most of the rest of us are not and so have high numbers).

On the right there’s a button to add the user to your iPhone contacts, (with the URL of their Twitter page, and their Bio as a note) or share that info like you would any iPhone contact.

The Profile page also shows the user’s Twitter bio, their location, and web site URL. Tapping on Location will open an embedded Google Map. Tapping on web will, of course, open an embedded browser and pull up the web site.

(And yes, I even like the pinstripes. They work. Apple uses them, and as such they do their job without drawing attention to themselves — which is a big part of their job. So I’m in the pro-pinstripe camp. There, I said it).

The next section shows the number of people the user is following, the number of followers the user has, the number of tweets the user’s posted, and the number of tweets the user has favorite’d. Tapping on any of those counters will bring up lists of the respective users or posts.

There’s a big Follow/Unfollow button for convenience (and you can choose to follow/unfollow from multiple accounts if you have them set up), and a services button which lets you access Tweet Blocker, Follow Cost, and Favstar.fm.

A More button lets you set Block Option and Notification Options (via Twitter’s built in SMS support — no support (yet?) for Apple’s Push Notification).

At the end, text informs you as to the user’s Twitter join date.

Along the bottom are icons for Profile (the page described immediately above), Timeline (a list view of that user’s tweets), @Mentions (a list view of that user’s mentions), and Favorites (a list view of that users Favorite’d tweets). Very convenient.

Mentions

Mentions functions similarly to the Timeline view, though of course is restricted to the tweets that contain your @username. Like with Tweetie 1.x, you can tap on @usernames to go to that user, on URL’s to open the URL, etc.

One element that’s been improved is reply chains. Now, when you tap on a reply, there’s an “in reply to” button beneath the tweet and tapping on that brings up a list view of all the linear tweets in that conversation. It’s not a very Apple-like button, mind you, and I raise that only because Tweetie has always been the most Apple-like of the Twitter clients for me, but it’s useful and it’s conceivable even Apple hasn’t figured out every usage case yet.

Direct Messages

Direct Messages also share much of the functionality of the Timeline view, though the “pull and release to refresh” doesn’t seem to be included here (and I’m not quite sure how to refresh that right now?).

Direct Messages are those tweets sent privately so only you and the sender can see them, and unlike the simple list view used for @mention reply-chains, these get the more chat-like bubble treatment. It’s an interesting visual differentiator, and the bubbles themselves make Apple’s look a little Aqua-dated.

Composing Tweets

There’s a nice, Email-style Compose button at the top right that’s consistent across all the major tabs — big points for that. Tap it and you get a writing pad view similar to Tweetie 1, but with a widget-ized character counter. The counter not only tells you how much more you can type before hitting the 140 character limit, but if you tap on it, it unveils a host of additional options: Camera, Photo Library, Geotag, Username, Hashtags, Shrink URLs.

Camera lets you take photos (or video on the iPhone 3GS) to add to your tweet, and Photo Library lets you choose from images already on your iPhone. Geotag adds your GPS location. Username and Hashtags bring up a search box that lets you quickly find other users or trends to add to your tweet. For example, if you reply to @friend1, and want to add @friend2 and @friend3, or #topic4, just search, tap, and it’s inserted at the cursor point. Shrink URLs will use your shortener of choice to compact a link and save you precious characters.

Other Twitter clients have had some of these functions already, but it’s great to see them implemented with Tweetie’s characteristic clean, simple interface.

Also, if you decide to Close a tweet without posting, Tweetie will now offer to let you save it to Tweetie’s new drafts manager, save it to the excellent Birdhouse app for further crafting, or to simply abandon it via Don’t Save.

Search

Search gives you the option to Search for content or username, and yes, you can save searches. Awesome.

You can also search Nearby (location based), which again includes embedded Google Maps with pins for nearby Twitter users. Tapping a pin brings up the user’s name, and tapping on that takes you to their profile page.

Also included on this screen is a handy list of currently trending topics on Twitter (no four letter words this time, luckily!)

More

More gives you access to your own Profile — and yes, you can now edit it right in Tweetie 2.0!

You can also get a list of your Favorite’d tweets, Go to User if you know a specific Twitter ID and you want to jump directly to that profile, and access the Drafts manager (which has a handy “send all” option).

Persistence and Offline Sync

If you’re using Tweetie 2.0 and you exit the app, it saves the exact state of the interface and the next time you launch Tweetie 2.0, it brings you back exactly to that state. So, if you were browsing your @mentions, you come back to those exact @mentions. Composing a tweet, you come back to that composition, already in progress.

It’s hard to express just how awesome this feature is, and other apps should adopt it immediately if not sooner. Yes, sure, it’s still not multi-tasking, but it makes the lack of multi-tasking far less annoying.

Equally awesome is that, if you’re offline for any reason (no WiFi or 3G/data available), Tweetie 2.0 will still let you go about performing actions, and will then send them to Twitter when you resume your online connection. Sublime.

What’s Missing

Yeah, no Push Notification. Atebits is currently happy with Twitter’s built in SMS feature, so it’s not on the current agenda. If you want Push Notifications, you’ll need a middleapp like Boxcar, or you’ll need to look elsewhere.

Also, while I personally never use them, there’s aren’t any themes yet for those who like to switch up their experience. No dark theme. No blubbly theme. No themes.

No group hacks either, though hopefully when Twitter rolls out Lists, Tweetie will add support in a future update.

Lastly, still no unread counts (like Mail’s little red dot that tells you how many new messages you have.

Conclusion

All the above, and we’ve only just scratched the surface of Tweetie 2.0. It’s an amazing upgrade, easily worth $2.99 for Tweetie 1.x users, if not more for new users. Either way, if you liked Tweetie 1.x, you’ll fine a whole lot more love for its bigger, better brother.

Bottom line — Tweetie 2.0 brings so much to the table, so simply and elegantly, and with such discoverability that it earns not only a high place among the iPhone’s crowd of Twitter clients, but among its apps in general.

As always, if you give Tweetie 2.0 a try, let us know what you think, and if you find any features we missed, let us know in the comments!

This is a story by the iPhone Blog. This feed is sponsored by The iPhone Blog Store.

App Walkthrough: Tweetie 2.0 Twitter Client for iPhone

qStatus is the App Store subset of the qTweeter Jailbreak app, and Echofon is the new name for Twitterfon. Confused yet? Don’t be, we’ve got the basics on both these iPhone and iPod touch Twitter clients!

qStatus [$0.99 - iTunes link] is designed to quickly let you update your Twitter (and/or Facebook status), either with text, or by sharing your current song, a photo from the camera or library, or a video from iPhone 3GS. There’s no reading functionality, but there is the typical Gx5 attention to awesome interface detail. Unlike qTweeter for Jailbreak, of course, there’s no multitasking “swipe-down-to-tweet-from-anywhere” functionality either.

Echofon [Free - iTunes link] or Pro [$4.99 - iTunes link] is, as mentioned, the new name for Twitterfon and the new Pro version includes Push Notifications (with optional “sleep” period so it doesn’t bother you when you’re trying to get some shuteye), sync with Echofon for Firefox on the desktop (formerly Twitterfox). Non-Pro users get bug fixes and the name change.

If you get your tweet on with either, let us know how they work for you (or help me test them via @reneritchie).

This is a story by the iPhone Blog. This feed is sponsored by The iPhone Blog Store.

Quick Twitter Apps: qStatus and Echofon Twitter Clients for iPhone

Tapped into the App Store and what did I see? Twitterrific 2.1, the latest version of the grand-daddy of all iPhone (and iPod touch) Twitter clients, locked and loaded, just waiting for me!

Updates include:

• Load more button to get older tweets
• Followers and following lists in author view
• Recording, posting, and viewing videos (presumably iPhone 3GS-dependent)
• Built-in WebView now goes landscape if you want it
• Saves battery via improved location update handling
• Tap and hold menus for tweet, links, photos
• Reply and re-tweet now have tap shortcuts
• In-app email support
• Optimized for iPhone 3GS

If you’re a Twitterrific user — or you want to be — and give it a whirl, let us know how the update works for you. I’ll be testing it out for the next couple days via @reneritchie, so feel free to drop me a tweet there and help out!

This is a story by the iPhone Blog. This feed is sponsored by The iPhone Blog Store.

Quick App Update: Twitterrific 2.1 Twitter Client for iPhone

Augmented reality applications, where live streaming video is overlaid with data in real-time, is coming with iPhone 3.1, and here’s a demo Twitter client to show yet another example about how this may be the next great killer app, or the next great killed-by-hype. Either way, we have only one question: is this how Skynet and the Matrix will find and terminate Twitter users first?

[via Poor Mojo]

This is a story by the iPhone Blog. This feed is sponsored by The iPhone Blog Store.

Monday Fun Video: Twit-A-Run Augmented Reality Twitter UI

Twitbit [$4.99 - iTunes link] is a Twitter client for the iPhone and iPod touch that provides built-in push notification for @mentions and direct messages (DMs).

For those of you still reading — those didn’t immediately jump over to grab it — what this means is you get all the functionality you’ve come to expect — reading, posting, multiple accounts, start and stop following, searching, trends, user profiles, reply chains, etc. etc. and you get any @mentions and DMs pushed straight to you without the need for an extra enabler app (which most other Twitter clients currently require).

The folks at High Order Bit were gracious enough to give us a sneak peak to try out, and I’ve been using it pretty much non-stop since. And… I’ve found all the functionality I need and then some. The push works wonderfully as well. So far, so fast.

One thing I particularly liked (but others may not) is that, when you get multiple @mentions or DMs, rather than having the latest obliterate the previous text alert (fix that by implementing a genius stacking system, will you Apple?), Twitbit collates them up. You don’t get to see the contents of the latest message, but you do get to see “X new @mentions and X new DMs” (see screenshot below). At least you have some idea of volume.

Of course, iPhone notifications being interruptive as they are, there’s still a chance something will pop up while you’re watching a movie or playing a game…

Given that limitation, more granularity as to who and what Twitbit pushes would be grand — and it’s likely forthcoming in an update — but wow are these young upstart devs and apps giving the entrenched Twitter clients a race for their functionality.

If you want an amply functioning Twitter client with built-in push notifications, take a serious look at Twitbit and let us know what you think.

Tons of screenshots after the break!

This is a story by the iPhone Blog. This feed is sponsored by The iPhone Blog Store.

Quick App: Twitbit Push Notification Twitter Client for iPhone

Boxcar [$1.99 - iTunes link] is almost more enabler than app. It only does one thing, but thus far it does it very, very well — it sends Push Notifications for Twitter @mentions and Direct Messages (DMs) that then open in either Tweetie or Twitterrific.

Setup is straight forward; you log into your account through an in-app view of Twitter’s website, and authorize Boxcar. You can select whether you want Push Notification for either @mentions, DMs, or both, and which of the aforementioned apps you want to open them in (hopefully support for more options will be forthcoming, such as Tweetdeck, Birdfeed, Twittelator Pro, etc.). You can also choose to automatically tweet them a shout out.

Like all Push-enabled apps, you can exit to the iPhone Settings to turn on or off Sounds, Alert (text boxes), and/or Badges.

That’s it. Sit back and enjoy Push Notifications so you can immediately know when anyone talks to or about you on Twitter. Even when you’re watching a movie on your iPhone. Or playing a game. Or writing an SMS. Or even taking a phone call — if anyone still does that…

In other words, it works so well, you may have to learn to better manage your Twitter interruptions.

Now the crux: is a couple of bucks a lot to pay for an app that arguably only extends the usefulness of other apps that you already paid a few bucks (or more) for? Depends on how badly you want Push Notification for Twitter, whether you’re willing to wait for full-on Twitter clients to add it themselves (however long that takes), and if you realize a couple of bucks is very little, and partly going to support the developers servers that are handling the Twitter calls and passing them on to Apple’s notification servers.

I bought it without a second thought. You’ll have to weigh the value (which is more important than cost) yourselves, and let me know what you think in the comments — or @reneritchie and I’ll get it right away via push

More pics after the break!

This is a story by the iPhone Blog. This feed is sponsored by The iPhone Blog Store.

Quick App: Boxcar Push Notification for Tweetie and Twitterrific iPhone Twitter Clients

If the iPhone and Twitter go together like chocolate and peanut butter, then for the most part current iPhone Twitter client developers give us many variations of the peanut butter cup. Tasty confections though they may be, and each unique and delicious in their own right, at the end they still tend towards variations of the peanut butter cup.

Enter Reportage from wherecloud [$2.99 - iTunes link], which rearranges those twin flavors like nouveau cuisine, utterly deconstructed and left for you to explore.

Too obscure? Okay, rewind. Reportage bills itself as a “radio tuner” for Twitter where followers are treated like stations on the FM dial and you can tune in (or tune out) to what they’re saying, and spin the dial to move from user “station” to user “station”.

It should be noted at the beginning that Reportage isn’t a general purpose Twitter workhouse. There are tons of those already. Like Birdhouse, which models itself on a “notebook” writing experience for Twitter, Reportage has also chosen to focus on one specific concept — pseudo-”live broadcast” of the Twitter users you follow.

Keep that in mind as we go along…

World View

Reportage is a single account Twitter client, so the setup is simple enough.

Once you’re done and enter — or subsequently launch Reportage — you’re placed into World view and presented with iPhone home screen-sized icons of the people you’re following, badged with the number of new tweets they’ve made since last you checked. The icons seem to be sorted by how recently they’ve tweeted, and only those that have tweeted fairly recently are shown.

There’s a refresh button top-right you can hit to update, at which point a a golden-yellow, highly contrasting status bar drops down at the top to give you visual reassurance something is really happening, and in a very nice touch, the icons animate as they fly around to re-order themselves.

Tap on an icon and you get a list view of that person’s tweets along with @mentions from people you also follow (with avatar for easy visual separation). If they’ve @mentioned you, it’s highlighted in green. A more button at the end does just what more buttons at the end tend to do.

The most interesting UI concept is found at the bottom of the list: the manifestation of the above-mentioned “radio tuner” — the other active user icons arrange themselves in a horizontal band and you can flick through them, a vertical band just like an old-style radio, indicating which one is currently tuned in. To highlight attention to UI detail, if you flick to a point in-between two icons, Reportage will drift on or back and center itself on the closest one.

Needless to say, you then get the newly “tuned” person’s tweet list.

Profile View

Tap on a tweet and you get that user’s name, follower count, and location along with the contents of the tweet and a date stamp.

I didn’t see nor could I find any “in reply to” indicator or button to allow tracing back through the reply train, which is something I personally do quite often but doesn’t really fit the “radio tuner” metaphor. Also, no indicator of which client was used to post the tweet, which is something that admittedly only client aficionados may miss.

If an @mention is in the tweet, tapping it brings up a webview of that user’s twitter.com/[username] page which is a tad disjointing. It would be nice if that could stay part of the Reportage user experience.

Tapping on an avatar (presented if the user is in your current World view) will take you to the Reportage profile page, however.

Tapping the small info icon at the bottom right brings up a screen displaying fuller stats, including followers, following, and updates, Twitter bio, homepage, etc. as well as a Follow/Unfollow toggle.

Interestingly, there’s also a Mute/Unmute toggle, which nicely fits the radio metaphor. Muted users are still displayed everywhere I could see, however an icon overlay shows that they’ve been muted. (I’m tempted to use the feature just for tweeting screenshots, however…)

Along the bottom are options to reply, resend (which uses the RT/re-tweet rather than via approach), message (direct message/DM), and star/unstar.

Star, which might be confused with Twitter’s own public “favorite” system, in Reportage allows you to favorite a user. Favored users get a star icon overlay and seem to become sticky in the World view so they don’t disappear if they’ve become tweeting slackers, momentarily or otherwise. It also gives them a place on the separate Star View screen we’ll get to later.

Composing Tweets

Heading back to the World view, the “compose new tweet” icon is top left and provides exactly the needed typing, location, picture adding, and trashing (clearing current contents) functionality you need.

Star View

Tabs along the bottom let you switch from Wold view to other views. Next in line is the aforementioned Star view, which is identical but contains only your Starred, or favored, twitter users.

At this point it’s important to remember that caveat about users only tending to exist if they’re in the World view. Combined with @mention links going to webviews rather than in-Reportage pages, it makes adding less-frequent twitter uses a challenge. For example, I wanted to add Dieter to my Star view — and while I may be the archetypal “dumb user” — I just couldn’t find a way to do it other than to wait and see if he’d pop up in my World view eventually.

Those who appreciate the concept of groups if not their complexity might find the Star view suits their needs very well.

Local view

Next along is Local view, which provides a list of location-based tweets within a user-selectable 1, 5, or 15 miles.

Me view

Last is your own [Username], or Me view. Tapping on your own view gives you a list of your recent tweets interleaved with @mentions sent in your general direction.

A Public/Private button lets you toggle to direct messages rather than @mentions. Somewhat confusingly to me at least, the dark rather than light button represents the current state, and labels not withstanding, hitting either button at any time switches between the two states. However, DMs are distinguished by a purple/burgundy color rather than green color so it’s apparent enough which type you’re looking at.

Again here, Reportage seems to limit you to users currently in your World view. Dieter, for example, @mentioned me yesterday wasn’t there, while someone more active who hadn’t @mentioned me for 5 days was.

Note, you can exit Reportage, go to Settings > Reportage > Filter and change the World filter anywhere from 1 hour, 1 day, 1 week, or none (no filtering). This didn’t expand the amount of users in my World view, however, but it did seem to increase the amount of @mentions in my [username] view. I still couldn’t get to Dieter, though, as the “more” loading stopped going back as far (12 hours only). My conclusion: Reportage doesn’t much care for Dieter.

(Joking, of course. We have every confidence wherecloud is working to address some of this — as appropriate to their app’s focus — in an update release.)

Conclusion

So this Quick App turned into anything but. Sorry for that. Blame Reportage for engaging my Twitter geek. Now, I can’t help coming back to Birdhouse by way of comparison. In Reportage we have another innovative take on a specialized, focused Twitter application designed to address the shortcomings of general purpose clients.

With the “radio tuner” metaphor, in keeping with Gruber’s Design Playground theory, Reportage works amazingly well at presenting and navigating current views of the Twitter users you follow, all wrapped up in a startlingly good UI.

Can’t wait to see where wherecould goes with it next.

This is a story by the iPhone Blog. This feed is sponsored by The iPhone Blog Store.

Quick App: Reportage Twitter “Radio Tuner” for iPhone