Social Networking

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Reviews / Social Networking
RockMelt

RockMelt Social Media Hub For iPhone

 

There are a bunch of Apps available these days to manage your social media experience. Many of them are "one trick ponies" that only manage one particular service such as Facebook or Twitter. There are a few Apps that keep track of all of this content in one place, but many are buggy and not quite as good of a user experience as the company sponsored Apps. That is until RockMelt. RockMelt brings all of your online content to one place for easy viewing, interaction, and use.  Not only does it keep track of your Facebook, and Twitter accounts, but it also lets you keep track of your favorite online content such as websites, blogs, and rss feeds. What makes RockMelt special isn't the content but how it displays and allows you to interact and view this content. With a simple UI (user interface), RockMelt lets you quickly and easily see if there is any new content available for each site or feed that you are following.

 

Desktop Application

RockMelt is a great stand alone content manager. When I first heard about, and downloaded it I didn't even know that there was a desktop counterpart to go along with it. After I logged in and started loading my content however, I realized that without the desktop application you are limited to the "popular" or suggested by RockMelt feeds. They have some of the most popular feeds available for selection right inside of the iPhone App, so some of the things you want to follow are ready to go, but if you want to follow say The Best App site, you have to add it on the desktop Application and it will sync over the cloud to your iPhone RockMelt App. (We are currently working on having The Best App site added to the suggested sites to follow, we'll keep you updated) My suggestion to you is this, download the desktop application first, and then download the iPhone App.

 

It Starts With Facebook

That's right, it starts with Facebook. The very first thing that you are asked to log in to upon launching the App is Facebook.  Doing this pulls your name, and profile picture strait from Facebook and sets them on RockMelt for your profile. It seems Facebook is the pivoting point for RockMelt and if you don't have a Facebook account, you can't sign in to use it. I'm not sure this is going to be a deal breaker for anyone because lets face it, if you don't have a Facebook account, you probably wouldn't want an App like this anyway. Before anyone yells at me, if you're that one person out there that has a Twitter account, has rss feeds that they want to follow, but don't have a Facebook account I'm sorry, you'll have to create one to use RockMelt. 

 

Where We Go From There

Like I said, you have to log in to Facebook to set up RockMelt, but from there the possibilities are vast. Within the iPhone App (not loading anything from the desktop application yet) you have a wide array of content to chose from. For example, I added my Twitter account @JasonLPhoto, CNN, The Oatmeal, Texts From Last Night, Fail Blog, Lifehacker, TechCrunch, Apple Hot News, and more just from the iPhone App! Each item has it's own icon, as well as it's name on what can be best described as a button. On the far right side of each button you will see a number indicating how many unread items you have for that particular site/rss feed. It's a simple yet effective UI.

Other useful features

As it stands Rockmelt is a really good content management App, however it does more. RockMelt has a built in browser of it's own so you never have to leave the App if you want to do a quick search for something on the web. Above the content buttons is a search bar that allows you to either input a search term or type in a web address. The search option launches Google with that search term inputted. Once you have found the web page that you are looking for you can either enter it and read/interact with it or you can use another of RockMelt's built in features, save for later. This will save the current content for viewing at a later time whether on or offline. This is a really handy feature. You can save things to view later when you might not have cell coverage, a really great addition.  The other nice thing about this feature is that it's across the cloud so if you save something on your desktop RockMelt browser to view later it also saves it on your iPhone to view later. Bookmarks too are synced across the cloud to both locations.

Adding Custom Content

Adding custom content to your selection is easy. Go to the desktop application and navigate to the website that you would like to add to your feeds. For example, go to http://www.terrywhite.com/techblog as I have in the image below. Click on the small green plus sign on the right side of the screen to open the Apps and Feeds Panel. From here you have to give it a few seconds to build the icon and pull the content. Once it does a green bar will appear under the Add Feeds heading that says "From Current Site". Click here and it will add that site, it's content and icon to your followed feeds. At this point all you have to do is refresh your feeds on your iPhone by pulling the content down until your see "release to refresh" and the new content will load. It's that simple. Now make sure that you add Best App Site and Terry White Tech Blog as in the example.

 

Room For Improvement

Let's be fair, this is a BRAND NEW App. They just released it this week so there will be updates in the future I'm sure, but there are a few things that I'd like to see. First, the interaction with Twitter and Facebook are basic. While you are able to do quite a bit within the Facebook portion of the App, most of the interaction revolves around your wall and news feed. There isn't near the control that you have with the actual Facebook App for iPhone. I hope that as time goes by RockMelt will add this control. The same goes for Twitter. There isn't near the control or functionality of the full on Twitter App. The basics are there however so tweeting, retweeting, replying, and seeing your @ mentions are all possible. Lastly, (and this is just me talking) I'd really like to see Best App Site as a recommended feed to follow :)

 

Best of It's Kind

This is the best App of it's kind I've seen so far. With the integration of the cloud and the desktop application coupled with the ease of use, I can't recommend this App enough to anyone wanting all of their social media content in one place fore consuming.

Get RockMelt from the iTunes store for your iPhone for free here: iTunes

Reviews / Social Networking
tweetbot

Tweetbot: A New Twitter Application

TweetbotThere is a new Twitter client on the block. It is called Tweetbot and comes from Tapbots, the makers of apps Convertbot and Weightbot, two apps which have been reviewed here before and gotten high scores. So, why am I taking a look at this new Twitter client at all then?

Well, first and foremost the official Twitter for iOS application is starting to shorten its links using the t.co shortener by default, allowing little control over how to display links at all. I fear this might just be the beginning of a series of bad choices for the app, the second being the #dickbar, making the rounds just a month or so ago. In addition, I do feel that it  doesn’t hurt trying new things once in a while.

The first thing you notice when even looking up Tweetbot in the App Store, is that it has a rather cute icon. When downloading the app, you’ll notice that the entire interface looks very good. Clearly clean and simple have been keywords during the design processes, as with the other Tapbots apps.

You do not get a Tapbots app for the unified iOS experience (that I am known to love) but for the innovative, well-designed user experience that resembles the iOS default, but is just slightly different. This is by far something negative. On the contrary, the app is very easy to use and does explore alternative ways of interacting with tweets in a timeline. To reply, retweet or perform other actions, you just click on a tweet to get access to a little options bar. To check for new tweets, you drag upwards past the top, as debuted in the first version of Tweetie for iPhone.

In terms of features, Tweetbot has what you expect. The entire twitter feature-set is there, including a clever implementation of lists. If you have different lists created in your Twitter account, Tweetbot lets you see a timeline specifically to these people. This way you can still follow a lot of people without having to see them all in your timeline.

One big negative I have with this app is perhaps not as much about the app itself, as with the devices it is available on. While it is available on the iPhone and iPod Touch, it isn’t (at the time of this writing) available for the iPad, which I am not particularly fond of. I must say I prefer having the same user experience on both my iOS devices when it comes to Twitter clients.

Conclusion

To be honest, the only real reason for wanting to switch to Tweetbot is the lists implementation, however this does not have to be a small feature. In fact, if you are following over 300 people and don’t mind creating a few lists (unless you already have them), go ahead and give Tweetbot a go. At $1.99 it isn’t too bad and it offers a nice interface, all the features that you have become used to in other Twitter clients, and a few more!

You can get Tweetbot from the App Store here: iTunes

Reviews / Social Networking
boxcar

Boxcar gives me control over my Push Notifications

 

Most social networking Apps can already do push notifications and even the built-in Apps can do it too. The problem with all the Push Notification features built-in to most Apps is that they are either on or off. In other words you can't control when you're notified. I first discovered Boxcar as a solution for getting Push Notifications of Google Voice SMS messages and Voicemails. Although the Google Voice Apps all do Push Notifications now, i don't use the built-in ones. I still continue to use Boxcar because of one major feature – Quiet Time! You can set a time range for when you DON'T want to be disturbed each night. I really don't need to know that someone retweeted one of my tweets in the middle of the night. Sure I could just turn my phone off, but often when I traveling I leave it on for potential emergency phone calls from home. 

Boxcar does more

Boxcar also usually does more than the built-in push notifications of these apps. For example, with Google Voice I don't want to actual SMS message displayed on screen. You can turn this off in the native Message App in iOS, but not in any of the Google Voice Apps that I've seen. No problem for Boxcar, just switch it to "Private Message" and Box car will just display a generic message on screen until you go into the App that you got the message in. Also with Twitter for example I use the "bird" sound to know right off the bat that the notification is Twitter related. 

Setup is really easy and once it's setup you can turn off the push notifications of the individual apps and just use Boxcar for your source of all notifications. I could easily give this App 5 stars, but I'd like to see a couple of things. First of all I'd like to see the list of Google Voice support apps updated faster. For example, right now I'm using GV Mobile + and the latest version isn't supported yet in Boxcar. Also I guess their servers get busy sometimes and notifications aren't instant during those times. I always get them, but not immediately in all cases. If that's a concern for your most important apps then you might want to stick with the native App's Push Notifications. Otherwise, I LOVE Boxcar!

You can get Boxcar for Free here from the iTunes

There is a $4.99 in-App purchase if you wish to disable the ads.

Reviews / Social Networking
skype

Skype Brings 3G Video Calling to the Masses

Just as we are closing out the year and picking our BEST Apps of 2010, Skype slides an update in just in time. Skype is known for allowing people to voice chat and video chat around the globe for free! That's right. If you have a Skype account and I have a Skype account we can talk for as long as we want over the internet for free. They even added video chatting from Skype to Skype as well. The only thing that was really missing from this was allowing people to video chat on mobile devices such as the shinny new iPhone 4 with its front facing camera. That update just hit the scene this week and I had a chance to check it out. While I love the quality of Apple's FaceTime (it was one of my main reasons for upgrading to an iPhone 4), the thing that keeps me from using it more often is that you have to be on a WiFi connection to use it. There are plenty of times where I'm in transit that I would do a quick FaceTime call if I could. Now I can with Skype!

Skype Video Calling works over 3G too

This is the big thing that separates Skype from Apple's FaceTime. Skype allows video chatting over WiFi or 3G, from iDevice to iDevice or iDevice to Mac or PC. Although Apple did bring out a FaceTime desktop client for Mac (still in beta), there's no hint of a Windows version. However, there are millions of uses using Skype every day on both Mac and PC that you'll now not only be able to talk with, but also video chat with. I did a quick test with my sister and we connected immediately. Then I tested it with Jason Lykins. I purposely turned off WiFi to see it work over 3G. There's no question that FaceTime's video quality is better and you would expect it to be since it requires WiFi. With that said I found the Skype quality to be totally acceptable over 3G (YMMV). What was more important to me was the voice quality while video chatting. I know that sounds weird at first, but what good is any call if you can't hear each other? Skype did the right thing by focusing on voice quality first and video second. This combination works well. You get all the usual things that you would expect. If you're using an iPhone 4 or 4th gen iPod touch you can toggle between the front camera, rear camera or no camera. If you're on an iPhone 3GS you can use the rear camera. If you're on an iPad you can see the other person and as soon as iPad's have built-in cameras I'm sure that Skype (OK, I'm hoping they will) will come out with an iPad native version.

 

The lack of One more thing…

Although I'm very happy to see this Skype update and I'd recommend it to any Skype user or person that wants to stay in touch while on the go, there is one thing still missing from this update! All of my other VoIP apps support Bluetooth headsets and that support still seems to be missing from Skype. I don't know what it is about them adding this basic feature since all the other apps I use have it, yet it's still not there. Otherwise, Skype away! This update rocks!

You can get Skype for free here from the Skype - Skype Software S.a.r.l

Reviews / Social Networking
gowalla3

Gowalla 3.0: A Leaner, Meaner Check In Machine

It has been a while since we reviewed the Gowalla app for the iPhone here on the site and since we did, many updates have passed, this week however with the most major one that changes things up a bit.

Front and center with the new update is a brand new interface that is now truly gorgeous to look at but also helps with making the app easier to use. Where it was previously harder to get to, viewing friends check-ins (both all and nearby), your trips, own passport and even checking in, these areas are all available from the main tab bar.

Gowalla - Alamofire

When it comes to checking in specifically, this window has loads of improvements, the first being that Gowalla tries to calculate where you are checking in, based on your history and current location. Instead of having to choose from a list of spots first thing, you are now presented with the computed best guess for your sought check in.

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