The latest web application in the spotlight called Pownce was launched by a crew of four comprised of Kevin Rose, Leah Culver, Shawn Allen and Daniel Burka last week. Initial comments from on-lookers have been both rather skeptic, and rather ecstatic. I’m part of the second group, Pownce is everything a Twitter user could wish for plus more. I have mulled it over for a few days before segregating my personal opinion.
Firstly, I’ll put it right out there. I am right behind Twitter, I love the idea and originality Twitter brought to the table when it launched back in March 2006, I have no current plans to leave the service. However, for a two week old service, Pownce has thoroughly impressed me through both form and function. Pownce improves on Twitter’s current feature set and in addition, includes a few extra features which differentiate it from Twitter.
The Essentials And Extra Additions
Pownce is very similar to Twitter from a quick scan. You add friends, post messages for others to read, and generally connect with other people. The difference is, Pownce adds to these features in a highly functional and appreciated way.
For example, messaging. When you post you have four options. You can post a Message, Link, File, or Event. Clicking on one of these dynamically refreshes that element of the page to reflect your posting choice. Your second choice is to chose who the message is intended for. The default setting is for “all my friends,” however this can be changed to either the public, or a specific person – in other words, Pownce can be used to connect with just your friends, the general public, or one specific person. Very handy for different instances and uses.
More specifically, you can set groups for different contacts. For instance, if you have a lot of Developers and Bloggers on your friend list you can conviently create a seperate Group for them. When posting, this group will be an option alongside all friends, the public, and individuals. This is essentially useful if you just want the Bloggers to know about your latest post, or just want the Developers to see a link you’ve posted to the latest Expression Engine build.
If you’re a Twitter use, you’ll be familiar with the process of using @YourNameHere to reply to others tweets. Pownce takes the art of replying to others in a whole new direction, just like Digg, Pownce has a threaded message system for replying to specific messages. This makes the process of holding a conversation very functional and easy to grasp a hold of.
To further test out Pownce as a tool of communication I asked my friends to post a quick one sentence review of Pownce in reply to my message. I received around 20 replies which can be found here. Below I’ve displayed a selected few which represented the views of a few different individuals.
Patrick Yan. Great web app from the $60 million man, Kevin Rose—but the lack of mobile (updating & browsing) and a real desktop app is keeping this from becoming as popular as Twitter.
Jeremy S. Pownce is basically a souped up version of twitter without the external inputs like texting and Instant Messages. Even though Pownce is currently small, I can see a bright future headed toward it.
Matt Brett. Seems like a lot of people are forgetting that Pownce is less than a week old and invite only beta. If this is beta, I can’t fu**ing wait to see what they have in store for 1.0!
Chris Marshall. I think Twitter is great for ’statements’ and has been massagd to death to allow conversation. Pownce has way more potential for developing discussions, building communities, and faciliating viral marketing
But I Want To Use Both
I’ve heard this statement numerous times over the past few days. People wanting to use Twitter in conjunction with Pownce instead of pick a favorite are in luck – you can cross post messages to both services.
The blog JetPacked has posted a brief tutorial on how to forward messages you post on Pownce directly through to Twitter.
Go to TwitterFeed.com and login with your OpenID. Create a new Twitter feed and enter your information. When asked for a feed, type in http://www.pownce.com/feeds/public/username. Select the frequency of posting. Be sure to deselect “Include description.”
This process will be handy for those who want to post messages to one service, but have them distributed to both. For now, I’m sticking with individually posting to both Pownce and Twitter, although cross-posting has struck me as a good solution for keeping involved in both.
A Very Strong Initial Release
Overall, Pownce hasn’t fail to impress. It’s a solid service which I assume I’ll be in constant contact with in the future. There are a few things I’d like to see added and improved on in the future, just like hundreds of other early adopters. Some features I’d personally be pleased to see in future updates include the following.
- Improved Desktop Application. Something which matches up to the elegance and functionality of Twitterrific, Pownce the desktop app needs thorough work if they want to take the service to the next level and be a realistic contender to Twitter. Kevin Rose, get in contact with the team at The Iconfactory and start talking. Period.
- Remove Default Email Notifications. Within hours of signing up to Pownce my inbox was full with over 50 automated emails notifying me of friend requests and messages. Please, have these turned off by default.
- Online Indicators. Allow users to see friends who are currently online by displaying a green indicator next to users logged in, and red next to users offline.
- Official iPhone Compatible Web Application. Move one step ahead of Twitter by developing an official version of Pownce directly compatible for the iPhone. There is yet no solid solution from Twitter for iPhone tweeting, here’s a perfect opportunity to gain one extra step in the race.
- Statistics. I’m a big fan of statistics, I enjoy seeing numbers rise (or fall) live, play by play. This isn’t an essential feature but it’d be “fun” to be able to view stats on your profile including how many messages you’ve sent, and how many times your profile has been viewed. Taking this a step further, how about Top 10 lists for various categories.
Conclusion
Overall I’ve been immensely impressed with the value Pownce has added to my online experience. I’ve felt so much more connected over the past few days – Pownce really is Twitter with all the trimmings you could wish for from a service which is only at version 1.0.
If you wish to add me on either site, feel free to do so. My Pownce profile is located here, and my Twitter profile is located here.
What are your thoughts about the Pownce vs Twitter clash? Which do you think will win the race, and most importantly, which are you using the most?