Well, it seems like yesterday that I launched TwitLi.st, a site that helps you find good people to follow on Twitter. I was playing with PHP and Twitter API the other day (btw, I should have an in-depth tutorial post on that too soon), and made HowTweets.com. (it’s basically the same code running on TwitLi.st but simpler)
Basically it’s a site where Twitter users can hashtag their tweets with #HWT, which HowTweets.com will collect and organize them according to the hashtags used.
For example, you can do a tweet such as, “How to make good Twitter Lists http://bit.ly/xyz #HOWTO #DIY #HWT“.
Then your tweets should get listed under HowTweets.com #HOWTO, #DIY, and #HWT tag pages.
Why in the hell did I make such a site?
Because lately I’ve been finding some great HOWTOs and DIYs on Twitter to blog about. I can use the regular Twitter search function for finding great HOWTO tweets but the problem lies when I try to search for the HOWTOs in my own Twitter account. In short, you can’t, Twitter Search only lets you search for all tweets, not just yours.
Well, actually if you use the advanced feature on Twitter Search, you can do a search but also only up to a certain point, you can go back more than like 500 tweets or somethin’.
HowTweets.com basically lets me “archive” all my tweets plus any tweets that other Twitter recommend me by adding #HWT hashtag to their tweets.
Btw, I am thinking this could some great open-source software, Twitter-archiving/Tweet-collecting PHP/MySQL software. If any of you guys are interested, let me know, I might develop it further for public use so you can archive your own tweets and easily find your own hashtags.
The more I am building these types of sites the more I realize that Twitter can be a great way to “bookmark” interesting sites you find on Twitter. (along with my new Twitter archiver, it’s AWESOME!)
For example, I can tweet a bunch of stuff and find it later such as #Photography, #Ubuntu, or whatever. Also since it runs on my own web server and it’s only the tweets I want (that I’ve tweeted), the hashtag function is super fast.
Well, check it out, it’s a fun little site. I try to keep minimalist graphic design to it, let me know what your comments on the web design part too, I am always striving to get better so….
I find that Twitter is a great, big, giant mass of real-time information that can’t be searched well, especially with time, so I made a simple site that will search it well and archive the stuff you are interested in most. For me, that was HOWTO/DIY stuff.
