The way the Twitter ecosystem grows is amazing. There’s hundreds of applications who give a lot more customization than the conventional Twitter Web service. And Twitter seems to be learning from them. The offset is possibly that it could throw the application off-track. Recently, we blogged about Twitter introducing ReTweet officially. And now, Twitter will soon be introducing lists.
What are lists? Lists are a collection of followers whom you prefer to classify under different tags. As an example, I follow a few people on Twitter. While using TweetDeck, I had classified them under Tech News, General News, Comics, Friends among other categories. Simply put, Twitter will now allow you to categorise those you are following. The lists that you create will be public and open for others to view (again, that can be changed with privacy settings). They may also choose to follow your list. Something like a Recommended Reading list.
So, the benefit. Those using the Twitter Web service will get an organised page where they can read tweets topic-wise (if you sort whom you’re following properly). There’s of course a lot of use that could be done with customisable lists. Like searching only within a select group. However, it seems strange that Twitter is introducing these features so slowly.
Services like TweepML provide the same service which allow you to create custom lists and follow them. Will the new Lists feature render them obsolete? Or will they improve their utility value as a destination for better lists? This will also get included with the API, which means all third-party applications will now support grouping.
Meanwhile, there are reactions abuzz about the Lists. Since the Twitter blog merely has given us a preview, the full utility and shortcomings are unknown. However, TweepML founder Marcel Calbucci was one of those invited to try out the new lists feature. The feature presents a direct clash of interest for him. On his blog, he’s put up the 10 major issues / differences with the Twitter List. Take a look at them.
There’s quite a buzz on the Web about how well Twitter can monetize it’s popular platform. With every addition to the Twitter API, it’s the Twitter ecosystem and the applications that benefit since as a rule of thumb, the platforms beat the Web Service hands down when it comes to utility. Does that mean ads as a source of monetization can DEFINITELY be ruled out?
