TwitteyBot allows you to schedule tweets - the schedule part is an important usability element. We could work on making a complex web user interface that helps the user with all sorts of scheduling, but a simpler solution is possible. Allowing the user to simply upload CSV files that contain the schedule of the tweets would let the user use other tools like MSExcel, etc to schedule more efficiently. We just released this feature with check- in 71. This feature is deployed on the application also. The CSV file should have the following columns
The date when it should be tweeted. This has to be in the format MM/dd/YYYY (example 12/31/2009).
The time, in the format hh:mm (example 13:15). Note that the hour should be in teh 24-hr format
The actual status message. This can be as long as you want and can be clipped using the web UI.
When using MSExcel, you can use 'autofill' feature for scheduling. If the date or time filed is empty, the date and time of the previous row is used. A video showcasing the various features is posted below.
I saw your Tweetybot. No doubt its cool. But, I am wondering about the usefulness of such tool. I am also a user of twitter and so do many of my friends.
I think we will tweet in 2 ways:
1. When we read something, say in a website or a blog, we would like to share it in twitter.
2. When we want to give status updates on our activities.
In the first case, we can not use your tool. Because, this would require me to copy the link (or the message) - minify the URL using some minification tool - and then paste it in excel sheet. Instead, I could just use the share this option present in any website or blog. If there is no share option, I can directly paste it in twitter. Much less work than the previous case.
In the second case, the personal status updates are merely present urges to post our status. If the same person with urge could wait for 10 minutes, probably he will feel stupid on posting his personal status and will not do it. So, In that case also the tool does not do much good.
While I have no doubts on the technical aspect of the tool, I am still wondering about the practical usability of this tool. Think about it.
@Sarangan The uses of twitter that you to mention seem to be limited. People have used twitter for a lot more things, including marketing and even payment. I use twitter to notify people about my online activities on flickr, picassa, reddit but re routing Friend feed output to twitter. I use it to remind myself about stuff. IMHO, the 2 uses you have mentioned are just a small portion of the zillion things that twitter can be made to you. People have found that they can read a holy book, the Bhagwad Gita, one verse at the time using the bot http://twitter.com/chantsofgita powered by this engine. Then there is http://twitter.com/matrixthemovie that screens matrix over the time of an year.
So, this is just a crazy experiment, trying twitter for things that you have not mentioned.
Hi - is it the same as time2tweet? I want to run a little bit longer experiment with it with a csv but I want to be sure it keeps working the coming two months
@edwin, This is the same as time2tweet. If you are looking at running a longer experiment, I would suggest that you host the application in your instance of Google App Engine. I can help you with that. If you dont want to do that, please used http://delayedtweets.appspot.com/index.html. This is an untouched instance and should help. I would also be monitoring it for errors.
I would love to use this but it seems to be buggy. I upload my file and all seems to be fine (other than "" appearing around every third tweet, which I have to delete). Then I click "Add" and all of the dates and times change. Any thoughts?
Hi there. I love this, but I seem to have the same EXACT problem the above Anonymous has. I don't mind the "at the front. The "at the end really messes up tweets ending with links (the " is added to the link, and thus nullifies it). I set my field to have an extra space and a . at the end after a link, so again - I can work around this without working hard. The problem seems to be the DATES. It doesn't maintain the date that is in the file. It does before you ADD - shows the right dates. After you hit ADD, it all changes - seems to be to the day before the date in the csv. Help us? THANKS, great GREAT idea and I'm working around it and still able to use it.
One more question/issue. How are you handling Time Zones? Is it linked to our zone set in our Google account?
Because at from after midnight 0:05 to 1:00am, I noticed that it REALLY goes crazy. It sends out 7-10 tweets at once, instead of how I have it set.
I'm in Central, you in Pacific, and the World in Eastern (LOL).
If I don't put in that hour, it doesn't go crazy much - though I still see where it just BATCH sends a set of 5 or more at the exact same time posting, where my file is no two posts go out at the same minute.
? I love this, think it is the best thing since sliced bread. If it wasn't here, I think I'd give up on being able to effectively use Twitter without driving myself crazy. With THIS, I can now sit and enjoy reading other people's posts, and replying and conversing, since most of what I quote, biz, or promote, is already handled by Time2Tweet work.
15 comments: