Sites Like Twitter – Other Ways to Microblog [List]

Keeping with the whole Twitter theme (from my earlier post), I wanted to talk about a few sites out there that are kind of like Twitter and may possibly one day become the great “Twitter killer”.

I don’t know about you, but I am getting kind of sick and tired of Twitter and all the hype and daily talk of it. Yet, Twitter is so widely used now, that I feel I have to use it; everything seems to revolve around it.

I do feel that Twitter is a great marketing and networking tool as well as a great tool for having public group conversations. I just feel that everyone is becoming obsessed and I’m just hoping that I don’t fall into the trance as well.

Plurk

“Noun. plurk (plüer-kh) – A really snazzy site that allows you to showcase the events that make up your life in deliciously digestible chunks.

Verb. plurk (plüer-kh) – To chronicle the events of your always on, action-packed, storybook, semi-charmed kinda life.”

I’ve been hearing so much about Plurk lately that I already think that it’s starting to take over Twitter, what about you? Plurk’s timeline is set up horizontally as opposed to Twitter’s vertical timeline, which is one thing that a lot of people are finding easier to keep up with. I’m still wondering though, why so many people are loving Plurk so much.

Jaiku

“Its main goal is to bring people closer together by enabling them to share their activity streams. An activity stream is a log of everyday things as they happen: your status messages, recommendations, events you’re attending, photos you’ve taken – anything you post directly to Jaiku or add using Web feeds.”

I am a member of Jaiku & to be honest, I don’t login too often. I basically see Jaiku as free promotion for any RSS that I want to import there. With the ability to import RSS feeds, what’s the point of logging in & actually updating your status there? I see none.

Pownce

“A way to send stuff to your friends. What kind of stuff? You can send just about anything: music, photos, messages, links, events, and more. You can do it all on our web site, or install our lightweight desktop software that lets you get out of the browser.”

I am a member of Pownce & I use it quite often. I really like Pownce because it’s easy to share links, notes, images & videos with your friends. Pownce is also great because it allows posts longer than 140 characters. Admit it, sometimes 140 characters (what Twitter forces you to do) just isn’t enough. Pownce is also integrated in quite a few applications like Flock browser, Pownce IM, Socialthing & HelloTxt, just to name a few.

MoodMill

“A social mood management website. It’s a personal mood management, a log, a quick ‘n easy website for managing and sharing your short logs with your contacts.”

I haven’t joined MoodMill yet but, it seems from the public timeline that the site is a little slow paced right now. Looking at the public timeline, I see that the last Mood was posted 4 hours ago. I do like the look though & I like the fact that you can attach an actual mood to your note.

Podobo

“A website designed to allow you to express your random thoughts, linked by tags, to other thoughts by users all over the world.”

I am pretty amazed at this site, mainly because it’s run by only one person. It’s basically a site to read and share conspiracy tweets.

Hictu

“The first service for video microbloggers, who can create for free their own microblog with small posts (containing text, audio and video), personalize their public profiles, manage a presence-enabled friend list, meet new friends.”

Hictu already has one up on Twitter since it allows you to post videos in your actual posts. You can also posts videos straight from your webcam, that’s a big plus. I can definitely see Hictu as being one of Twitter’s biggest competitors.

Spotjots

“Let your friends and family experience and follow your life…as it happens. Share what you’re doing from the web, or capture your experiences in real-time using your phone.”

Spotjots adds a map screenshot to your posts. I’m not sure how that works but I’m wondering what happens to people who don’t want their location disclosed; some people are very private. I guess Spotjots is more about finding people around you & finding out where you friends are. The timeline setup is pretty much like Twitter though.

Utterz

“Lets you create and follow discussions with friends or people with similar interests. Utterz can be audio, video, pictures and text. You can create or join a discussion from any mobile phone or computer.”

From first glance, Utterz definitely looks like a site that can become as addicting as Twitter. As-a-matter-of-fact, they seem to be setup the same way. One advantage is that Utterz let’s you view all the members page by page, making it easier to see who’s on the site. Utterz uses the “@ system” just like Twitter & even allows cross-posting to other social networking sites. I smell a definite Twitter rival.

DailyBooth

“One big conversation about your life, through picture.”

Instead of telling people what you’re doing through words, you show them what you’re doing with pictures. You can login everyday to take a new picture and see what pictures others have posted. There is a live feed on the homepage that lets you see new pictures as they’re posted on the site.

Identica

“A micro-blogging service based on the Free Software StatusNet. You can share notices about yourself with friends, family, and colleagues.”

Identica once had its time to shine, but now it’s pretty dead. You will see that most people are simply importing content into it from other sites. The homepage updates in real-time and you can pause it if needed. Unlike Twitter, you can also create and join groups based on different topics. Everything else like @mentions and hashtags are pretty much the same.

Here’s a few others that I think may give Twitter a tiny bit of a scare, but definitely nothing to worry about:

http://plazes.com/ – Right place, right people, right time.
http://yobird.com/ – There’s a lot of hype about this site, yet it still remains a mystery as to what exactly it’s about.
http://twoorl.com/ – A Twitter clone.
http://www.twitterkiller.com/ – A wannabe Twitter killer that killed itself?
http://zobzee.com/ – “It’s like Twitter & FriendFeed combined… but so much awesomer!”
http://www.smsgupshup.com/ – A fun & easy way to send messages to a group using SMS.
http://wassr.com/ – A simple service for people from around the world to share what they are doing at this moment.
http://ticketapp.com/ – A mixture of a tumblelog, a todo list & a status notifier.
http://www.fuzz.com/blip/welcome – Your personal music station, DJ’d by you & your hand picked list of friends and favorites.

(Thumbnail Source)

Technorati Tags: micro-blogging, networks, online communities, social networking sites, twitter