Twitter bought TweetDeck a couple of weeks back for a hefty $50 million (figure is based on reports and has not been confirmed by Twitter or Tweetdeck). This is an interesting development, especially as Twitter is almost completely against third-party clients that replicate the core functionality of what Twitter does in it’s official family of apps.
Both TweetDeck and Twitter have native applications for Macs, with TweetDeck having one for PC too. You can find both apps on your smartphone too, whether it be Android or iOS. However, they both compete for web app love since Twitter has it’s official website, and TweetDeck has it’s Chrome web app. Today, we’re going to compare the two and see whether, from a web app-only perspective, the deal is worth it for the web apps.
Twitter.com
Twitter’s own website is an effort to create more of a fully fledged social network and is always at the forefront of any developments in the social network. The main view of this particular web app features two columns that can adapt to the window’s size. On the left is your stream where each user’s tweets are shown, sorted by the time they were posted. On the right side is a column that adapts regularly. By default, it shows profile data such as your follower count and suggestions, alongside the trending topics. When you select an individual tweet, this column will show that tweet plus any relevant data, alongside any media that was attached.
Twitter.com has a focus on most aspects of the social networks’ strategy. It focuses heavily on your content, but equally on expanding your reach by suggesting new users to follow, and showing the trending topics of the day.
In the deal, Twitter.com will not change, it seems, and will not take on the multi-column design that TweetDeck holds.
Can anyone spot Michael from our Android site?
TweetDeck
TweetDeck presents Twitter’s content in somewhat of a different way. It’s heavily based on columns, but not like the duo that Twitter use. Instead, in the web application that’s exclusive to Chrome users, your various types of messages are shown in individual columns. For example, there’s a column for your followed stream and another for your mentions allowing you to have them side-by-side.
TweetDeck is a client, and follows the same principles that make trends and follow suggestions less prominent. Instead, the focus is clearly just on the posts and messages in TweetDeck. Plus, the web app displays pop ups in the top corner of your screen when you have new tweets to read, something that not even the native Twitter app does.
Additionally, TweetDeck aggregates other social networks into the app with their own columns. So you can have a column of Twitter updates next to your Facebook stream to monitor two (or more) networks at a time.
TweetDeck founder Ian Dodsworth has confirmed in an interview that TweetDeck will remain a separate app, at least for the time being, and will still aggregate other social networks like Facebook, an advantage over Twitter’s web app.
TweetDeck prefers columns over tabs.
Which One is Better?
I used TweetDeck for a long time when I was using Windows and had several accounts to manage, thanks to the high customisability of it’s interface. I could have a column of my feed from one account and the mentions of two accounts display across one window. The constant notifications – visible and audio – are extremely helpful in cases where you need to monitor your feed under certain circumstances.
On the other hand, Twitter is a little more simplistic and makes you feel like you’re actually part of a social network, rather than some group instant messagenger.
Which one do you prefer? Would you like TweetDeck’s column interface to come over to Twitter? What about vice-versa? Let us know in the comments!