40Tech » Twitter

Summify Acquired by Twitter (and Going Bye Bye)

Bobby Travis — Thu, 26 Jan 2012 03:27:55 +0000

Back in August of last year, we wrote about Summify, a fantastic tool for getting to and sharing the highlights of your social streams and feeds. I’ve used this tool religiously for the past several months and have found it to be incredibly useful, especially with Twitter. Just last week, however, I received an email from the Vancouver-based start-up and discovered that they had become yet another in a long line of services to be snatched up and absorbed by a tech giant — in this case, Twitter. Great for them, but sad for you and me.

The Summify team will be moving to San Francisco, where they will become a part of Twitter’s growth team. Summify the service will be stripped down for the time being, and will eventually shutdown altogether as a standalone product.

Here’s the main list of changes from their announcement:

New account registrations have been disabled.
Email summaries remain, but only for a few weeks, and then they are gone as well.
Users will still receive their summaries via the web app (and the iPhone app, as well, I believe), but will no longer be able to make them public.
Profile and influence pages are gone, as is auto-publish.

I’ve also noticed that sharing posts to Twitter from Summify no longer adds credits to the end of the tweet. Previously, the tweet would add in an @mention to a few of those in your network that shared the information with you in the first place, but this is no longer the case, at least from the mobile app.

There is no word yet as to when Summify will shut down completely, or what cool newness might arise in Twitter as a result. Either way, while I’m happy for the people behind the great service, I will really miss Summify as a standalone tool. Hopefully, something truly great comes out of this. In the meantime, we can only hope that Zite — and maybe Flipboard — will pick up the slack by improving how they filter our streams.

Here are some related posts that might interest you:

Social Media Overload: How Has Your Social Media Usage Changed Since the Release of Google+? [Reader Feedback]

Evan Kline — Tue, 01 Nov 2011 01:00:18 +0000

We’re big fans of Google+ here at 40Tech. In fact, if you follow the Twitter accounts of either 40Tech or Bobby Travis, you’ll see that we’re not posting there quite as much as we did in the past. Are we alone in the way Google+ has detracted from our ability to be as active on Twitter? Let us know how your social media usage has changed since Google+ has arrived.

Has your usage remain unchanged, and Google+ doesn’t interest you? Are you finding time for multiple services? From a personal perspective, I do find that there are only a certain number of hours in the day. My Twitter usage has suffered the most. I continue to scan my stream for headlines, so Twitter still acts as the pulse of the Internet for me in some ways. But my Twitter posting is less than it was before Google+ arrived.

My Facebook usage, on the other hand, hasn’t really changed. That’s because I use Facebook for different reasons than the other services. Facebook is strictly a vehicle to keep up with real world friends for me, and most of those friends aren’t even on Twitter or Google+.

How about you? How has your usage changed (or not changed)?

Headache image by Sarah G.

Here are some related posts that might interest you:

Plume: My Android Twitter App of Choice [App of the Week]

Evan Kline — Wed, 31 Aug 2011 01:00:15 +0000

I have a confession to make. If I follow you on Twitter, there’s a good chance that I don’t see any of your tweets. Twitter got so busy for me, that the only way that I could manage it, was to sort people into lists. I have several lists, but I have one super-special list for the tweets of users that I don’t want to miss. When I’m busy, that’s the only part of Twitter that I ever see. When I try out Twitter apps, therefore, list support is the first thing I check out. That’s why I use Plume . . . but I’m open to suggestions for an app that handles lists even better. If you know of one, let us know in the comments.

I’ve tried several Android Twitter clients, hoping to find one that would load my main list on startup, by default. I struck out. My fallback was to find an Android Twitter client that would allow me to get to my main list quickly and easily. Plume fit the bill. I tap the “+” symbol while it is loading my stream, then tap “Lists” and the name of my list. Perhaps another Twitter client requires fewer taps, but Plume felt the fastest as far as getting to my list.

Plume has other features as well. My favorite is the ability to assign colors to different users. This makes tweets from those users really stand out in your stream. Like other Android Twitter apps, Plume also integrates with the system, allowing you to use the share menu in other apps to send content into Plume. Other basic functionality includes the display of @mentions and direct messages, and the support of favorites, hashtags, trends, search, and muting of users. Plume also comes with widgets, if you want to display your stream on your home screen. Plume is also highly customizable, letting you change the font, hide or show avatars, change the sort order, and more.

Right now, Plume is my Twitter app of choice. It’s free on the Android Market, although there is a paid version which removes ads. If someone knows of an alternative that allows for the display of a list as the default view, though, I’d consider switching. What’s your favorite Twitter client?

Plume [Android Market]

Here are some related posts that might interest you:

How To Bring the Classic Retweet (RT) Back to the New Twitter

Evan Kline — Mon, 08 Aug 2011 01:00:08 +0000

The revamp that Twitter rolled out on the Twitter website a few months ago was, by and large, a nice upgrade. The sidebar is now pretty useful, and the whole experience is a bit more streamlined and efficient. One feature that many people don’t like, though, is how the new Twitter handles retweets. The old method of retweeting (the “RT @” method) allowed you to editorialize a bit, if you wanted. Under new Twitter, the retweet button simply rebroadcasts the original tweet, unedited. You no longer have the ability to add any thoughts to the tweet, short of starting a new tweet. Google+, and the way it fosters interaction, has shown us that geeks love discussion and editorial, if the topic is right. If you want to bring back the classic RT to Twitter web, you can. Here’s how.

For this to work, you need to be using Firefox or Chrome as your web browser. If you are, install the Classic Retweet extension. Once you do, go to Twitter.com, sign in, and hover your mouse over someone else’s tweet. Right there underneath the tweet, next to the “Retweet” link, you’ll see a “Classic RT” link. Click that, and the tweet will be retweeted, using the “RT @” format.

I found that when the new retweet functionality was introduced, I started tweeting much less. Maybe it was just coincidence, or maybe the obstacles to engagement caused me to lose interest in Twitter. How about you? What are your thoughts on Twitter’s new retweet functionality?

Classic Retweet extension [via Mediabistro, as tweeted by Steve Rubel on Twitter]

Here are some related posts that might interest you:

Summify Cuts Through the Chatter, Helps You Get The Real Goods From Your Social Streams

Bobby Travis — Sat, 06 Aug 2011 05:50:53 +0000

Summify has been acquired by Twitter and will be shutting down. See this post for more detail.

I’d like to take a moment to step away from the general worship and awe of Google+, and circle back (hehe) to our old friend Twitter. Actually, I plan to talk about Summify, and how it can take the often-overwhelming amount of information that is travelling through your Twitter stream at any given time, and sort it into a “highlight reel” that can be shared as a whole and as individual posts. It’s easy, it’s effective, and maybe just a little bit brilliant — and I have no doubt it will save you time and make your online reading much less hectic.

Click here to view the embedded video.

Multiple Accounts

Summify isn’t just about Twitter, either. Sure, it can connect to as many Twitter accounts as you like, but it also connects with Facebook and Google Reader. In fact, the more accounts you add, the better your summary will be.

Control

You get to decide how often you get a summary, how many stories it contains, when it gets delivered to you, how it gets delivered, who gets to look at it, and whether or not it gets published to your accounts. For example: my Summify is set up to deliver a new summary of 10 stories, twice per day (at 8:30am and 8:30pm), to my email inbox. Others can view it, and I automatically publish a link to the summary on my main Twitter and Facebook accounts. I could have allowed Summify to send me a Twitter DM notification as well, but between email and the recently released iPhone app, I’m covered.

When you select a link in Summify (from email or your main summary), the article opens up with a handy toolbar on top (which you can close, if you want) that allows you to share the post on one or all of your connected networks. You can also see the avatars of the people who shared the article with you in the centre of the toolbar, and hover over them to view the originating tweet and click through to their account.

If you don’t like the article and think it shouldn’t have been in your summary, you can click the little thumbs-down button to add it to your Filters list. This is a nice and easy way to weed out spammers and other annoying sites that occasionally sneak through. In fact, when you are in the Summify web app, itself, you can thumb an offending article down right then and there, without ever opening it. You can also filter by contributor, allowing you to block specific people from contributing to your summary. All you have to do is hover over one of the avatars below any given article, and then move your mouse over the little “x” that appears in the top right, and click it. This, and the thumbs-down functionality aren’t available in the email, of course, but they are also missing from the iPhone app; something that I hope changes, soon. Thankfully, though, Summify is smart enough that it gets it right about 98% of the time. And the iPhone app is pretty, and so is easily forgiven.

People-Friendly Messages

When Summify sends out a summary message it takes great care to do two things: 1) It mentions some of the people who provided you with the information in the first place; which makes for nice Twitter etiquette. 2) It varies the messages so they aren’t always the same boring words with a new link. As an example, take a look below at three recent tweets (not clickable) that Summify sent out on my behalf.

It should also be noted that mentions are automatically included in share of single posts, as well, and that you can edit the content of single-post shares before posting.

Easy, Good Looking, and Smart

Take the section-title anyway you like, but understand that it’s true, and it’s awesome! The apps (and even the emails) are easy on the eyes and easier to work with, and the service is smart enough to not only consistently deliver articles that you like, but it also will list out several other stories from websites that post multiple posts. This makes sure that you get all the highlights from Mashable and other large sites without having to visit them directly or open up another app.

I’ve been using Summify for a month or two now, and I’ve lost count of the number of hours I’ve saved by not scanning through the muck that is sometimes Twitter, and by not chasing down every shiny post in my 49 or so RSS feeds. Summify helps keep things clear and easy to manage, and has even kept me relevant on Twitter while I play with Google +. Speaking of Google +, I’m hoping that we’ll see it integrated into Summify soon (they already have the +1 button). Even better, Summify should be integrated into the Sparks feature! Now, that would be sweet! * pokes Google *

Note: For those interested, Summify is located right here in my (rarely) sunny home-city of Vancouver, and they have had the benefit of advising from the CEO of another little local social app called HootSuite. Maybe you’ve heard of it? :D

Give Summify a try and tell us what you think!

UPDATE: Summify has recently updated its look (pretty much the day after this post went up). It was pretty before, but now it’s awesome! It also includes Instapaper integration.

Here are some related posts that might interest you:

[Reader Survey] How Many Tweets By One User Are Too Many?

Evan Kline — Mon, 11 Apr 2011 01:00:55 +0000

We’ve been getting some great feedback from you over the last few weeks, from how many devices you have connected to your network, to how many email addresses you use, to whether you cross post on Facebook and Twitter. Now we’re looking for your input again. We’d like to know at what point you say “enough already!” when you see a wall of tweets from the same user.

We plan to take your input to heart here at 40Tech, as we weigh how to use our own Twitter account. Would you prefer to see our Twitter stream used mostly to announce new posts? Do you like mostly new posts, with the occasional outside link or observation thrown in? Or do you like seeing a long stream filled with tweets whenever we find something that interests us?

As usual, there is no right or wrong answer here. While my eyes glaze over when I see a wall of tweets or links (mostly because I just don’t have the time to review everything, and don’t want to spend all my time reviewing tweets from one person), I might be a fringe case. Well, I’m definitely a fringe case according to my wife, but that’s a different subject.

So, let us know – is there a sweet spot for tweeting?

Here are some related posts that might interest you:

So Much For New Media: Study Shows That Mainstream Media Drives Twitter Trends

Evan Kline — Mon, 28 Mar 2011 01:00:35 +0000

For all the talk about “new media,” it appears that old media still powers the online trends of today. Last month, HP released the results of a study that showed that user activity and number of followers on Twitter do not contribute strongly to trend creation and its propagation. Instead, mainstream media play a role in most trending topics, and act as a feeder of these trends.

HP’s director in charge of the study noted “Twitter users . . . seem to be acting more as filter and amplifier of traditional media in most cases.” The study involved an analysis of 40 days worth of Twitter data. Of the resulting 16.32 million tweets, HP identified 22 users who were the source of the most retweets when a topic was “trending.” Of those 22, 72% were Twitter streams run by mainstream media outfits such as CNN and the New York Times.

Why do you think traditional media sources still reign on Twitter? Is it because traditional media still are the source of most stories? Or is the power of new media diluted by pop stars, Hollywood actors, and other users who might post more trivial material? Or could you argue that the “powerful” Twitter users really are driving the trends, because the mainstream media source would never get the attention that it does without the power users? Let us know your thoughts in the comments.

HP research shows mainstream media drive Twitter ‘trends’ to a surprising degree [The Official HP Corporate Blog]

Here are some related posts that might interest you:

Do Your Cross Post on Facebook and Twitter? Why or Why Not?

Evan Kline — Mon, 07 Mar 2011 02:00:15 +0000

We’re looking for a little reader feedback here. The title of this post says it all – do you post the same content on both your Facebook and Twitter accounts? If so, why? If not, why don’t you?

There’s no right or wrong answer here. We’re just looking for your thought process. We cover both sides here at 40Tech. I don’t crosspost, while Bobby sometimes does. My reasoning is simple, and is particular to my situation. I use the official 40Tech Twitter account, and as a result have different audiences on Twitter and Facebook. Many of my Facebook friends have little interest in tech-related posts, so I don’t want to bury them with updates. They know where to find my tech posts if they want them, and if they do follow me in both places, they probably don’t want to see the exact same updates repeated in two places.

How about you? Everyone’s situation is different, so let us know in the comments whether you post the same content in both places, and why or why not.

Here are some related posts that might interest you:

Clean Up Your Twitter Followers With FriendorFollow.com

Evan Kline — Wed, 02 Mar 2011 02:00:00 +0000

Are you guilty of following people on Twitter simply because they follow you? How will you know if they stop following you? Or maybe the reverse is true, and you want to see who is following you, but that you’re not following? In either of these situations, FriendorFollow.com can help.

With FriendorFollow, you input your Twitter username, and then can choose to see a few lists: people that you follow who aren’t following you back, people who follow you who you aren’t following in return, and mutual friends. If you authorize Twitter from within FriendorFollow (which uses the Twitter authorization API), you can follow and unfollow people from within the site. FriendorFollow is a great tool if your Twitter follower list has gotten out of control.

FriendorFollow.com

Here are some related posts that might interest you:

Schedule Your Tweets for Maximum Impact

Evan Kline — Tue, 15 Feb 2011 02:00:51 +0000

Do you ever feel like your tweets are falling on deaf ears? Does it seem like the big shots get all the Twitter love? Timely is a web app that purports to combat those problems, enabling your tweets to be published “when they’ll have the highest impact.”

To use Timely, you have to create an account ,and then authorize Timely to use your Twitter account. You then write your tweet from within Timely, and go about your business. The tweets aren’t published instantly. Instead, Timely analyzes your past 199 tweets to figure out the best time slots, and uses this information to auto-schedule your tweets. If you prefer, you can tell Timely to publish your tweet within 30 minutes. Timely also claims to be able to learn as your followers grow.

I find a service like this interesting, since Bobby and I have previously pondered when we should publish our tweets. I’ll be curious to see how effective it is.

Timely is free, but you can also purchase a Pro account for $9.99 a month or $99 a year. The Pro account gives you improved analytics, the ability to post to Facebook and LinkedIn, the ability to email tweets, and more.

Is this a service that you might use?

Timely [via Steve Rubel]