When Twitter users aren't sending 140-character updates for miniature conversations, or when they're not complaining about the service's lack of uptime, very often they're sharing links, be it items they've found interesting, or hyping their own blog posts.A new service called TweetSmart is looking to harness these links, not in aggregate, in an attempt to rank popular items as ReadBurner, RSSMeme, AlphaTwitter, Feedheads and LinkRiver do, but instead, to act as a real-time link blog aimed to get an instant snapshot of the best content the Web has to offer.
TweetSmart is essentially an extension of Twitter's direct message service, or DMs, with some interesting wrinkles thrown in. TweetSmart users are encouraged to send links to the TweetSmart Twitter account, and to use one of 11 categories provided by the site, ranging from mortgage and real estate to Web, technology and social media. Depending on the category you choose, your link will be properly tagged, featuring the icon of the category you selected.To use the service, all you need to do is follow the user "twsm" via Twitter, and alert the TweetSmart crew you want to participate. If they follow you back, you're given access to the site.
The TweetSmart Link Blog in Action
To send links to the shared TweetSmart feed, use the format:
- "d twsm category type your message here"
- "d twsm web Read Write Web asks: How Many Friends is Too Many?http://tinyurl.com/6e98dz"
Unlike my Google Reader shared items link blog, which only displays those items I've personally liked, TweetSmart aggregates all links pushed through, in chronological order, from newest to oldest. Unsurprisingly, so far, the site has been overweighted with Social Media links, but that can change depending on the active users, of course.
There are three developers behind TweetSmart (See: About Us - TweetSmart), including Morgan Brown, Paulo and Steve. As with other social link sharing sites, I can see this being valuable for smaller communities, and less valuable as the service gets overcrowded. If TweetSmart wants to graduate from interesting novelty to actual service, it'd be best to create something of a friends feature, where you can follow specific users, or filters to only show specific categories. Without having their product roadmap in front of me, I can't tell you what they will or won't do, but it looks clear to me that those would be some first steps.
To check out TweetSmart, head to www.tweetsmart.com, and don't forget to add "twsm" on Twitter. The team's official blog can be found here.