Twitter has created a community where individuals can tap into people / information they never had dreamed possible before. I for one have made many interesting contacts from website designers, plumbers, ex-felons to leaders of various industries.

One way that we can show our gratitude for the hard work the Twitter guys put in is to give them constructive feedback to help them make it into an even better site.

The other night I asked my Twitter friends how they would improve Twitter.

Here are the 11 top improvements from the list:

1. Threaded Messages: allows to quickly see replies to tweets
2. Search within your own updates: currently no easy way to search through ones updates
3. Reinstate Twitter Instant Messaging: if it’s good enough for Facebook…remember way back when we used to be able to do this?
4. Ability to create groups: organize your Twitter friends into groups so you can manage them better
5. RSS for customized groups: related to the above – keep track of groups you’re interested in
6. Filters on updates to avoid noise: there are just some days where you’d wish people would shut up
7. Popularity tweets of friends, tags: trending of hot topics within your own profile page
8. Tweeter Timezone display: Not everyone has their profile filled out properly so it’d be good to display their local time so you can tweet accordingly
9. Common insterests with other people: Like the StumbleUpon and Digg way of meeting more like-minded people
10. Easy ReTweet ability from Twitter Profile Page: ReTweeting is a big part of the Twitter community
11. Get rid of the more button: I can understand that this would save on server load so in my view a nice-to-have rather than mandatory

Do you agree? How would you improve Twitter?

Thanks to the following Twitter users for their input (Follow them):

@Jking89
@labeet
@EmVicW
@mistygirlph
@DigitalSignals
@amitsiwal
@gatorjohn
@iamnotjustmummy
@pedaah
@WillHughes
@netwizard2003
@LostInInaka

Oh and don’t forget to add me too @mr_gadget

Of course I don’t want the whole world to know every single one of my goals but one that I would like a little help on is in the area of fitness. My goal for 2009 is to jog at least 100 times throughout the year – this equates to around 2-3 times a week which is realistic for my busy schedule. If you haven’t set any goals or don’t know how to, click here for my post on 5 Tips on Goal Setting.

How to Use Twitter for Goal Setting and Tracking
Once I set my goal, I turned my attention towards creating an identifier that:

1. Explained what my goal was about
2. Easily remembered for search purposes

In Twitter, you can define events or topics with a “#” in front of keywords. Try these out in Twitter Search and you’ll see what I mean #happy09, #gaza and #haiku.

So in regards to jogging, I decided on #2009Jogging. Here’s what it looks like:

I’m 2/100 yay! Even picked up another person who was inspired by the idea.

For each #2009Jogging, I want to include useful information to help me track this goal and give readers visibility of my progress. I’ve decided to include number of jogs out of 100, distance run, any additional exercise and weight. By using the #2009Jogging in Twitter Search, I’ll be able to get a good summary of my ability to reach my goal.

Hope this provides you with another handy way to use Twitter. Feel free to add me if you’re on (mr_gadget).

Even better, who’s going to join me for 100 jogs in 2009?!

According to Hubspot.com, Twitter usage is increasing very rapidly with an estimated 5,000-10,000 new accounts being created everyday.

As a business owner (Mr.Gadget), Twitter provides a new way to connect even closer with an international market which is exactly what I have been trying to tap into with my new web projects that are underway.

The other powerful thing about Twitter is the love Google gives each user page – I’ve seen some Twitter accounts whose users have trivial websites (not regularly updated and poorly ranked) have Twitter user pages with Google page ranks of 6/10! This translates into humongous backlinks to wherever it gets pointed to. It’s like their Twitter page has become their website and given them an audience and search engine power that before they could only dream of.

I only started Twittering in earnest at the start of November. Today I have 2,300+ followers, not because I am overly captivating but because I believe I have figured out how Twitter works. As a result, I’m slowly compiling an eBook on how what Twitter is, how to attract a large following in only a couple of weeks and then how to use it to help your business.  Keep an eye on this blog for more information. If you’re super keen to get tips right away, send me a direct message or @ message on Twitter (mr_gadget).

Again if you’re not on Twitter yet, I encourage you to get on and start building your network and profile.

My friend Darren (@problogger), has also created a website to help you with a tonload of Twitter tips. His website is : http://www.twitip.com (make sure you tell him I sent you!).

Add me on Twitter:

http://www.twitter.com/mr_gadget

Via Techcrunch

So with this extra couple of minutes a day I had free, I decided to create my own mini-Digg site : Nudgeville. It works very similar to Digg; submit stories, promote it and make friends. The difference between the two, will be, Nudgeville will have a friendly environment. Through moderation and communication it’s my goal to make this a site where people can share stories and comment without getting their heads bitten off.

Please check it out if you haven’t.

I’ll be running a competition in the next couple of days to get the word out so keep an eye on the Nudgeville Blog.

I am an open-minded guy so if you have any feedback in how I can improve the site, please let me know.

See you in Nudgeville!

To do this, I need to list down all the sites that I visit on a daily basis and then prioritize the maximum time I should spend on each. I’ll address the latter in a future post.

Here’s my list:

My Daily “Must-Visit” Web Site List:

1. Alexa: Traffic Rankings for my 3 blogs
2. Google Adsense: Advertising revenue – it’s nice to see how these figures update almost real-time.
3. My Blogs: Mr.Gadget Australia, Arnold Aranez dot com and Gadget Loop (new site)
4. Kontera: Another advertising revenue website
5. Affiliate Websites: Clickbank
6. Plurk: Social media website that acts as a micro-blog with graphical timeline
7. Twitter: Micro-blog which I post a couple of announcements per day
8. Stumble Upon: Social bookmarking tool
9. Digg: Social bookmarking app
10. Google Gmail: Check in to read and reply to mail a couple of times a day
11. Technorati: occasionally pop-in to see how my Technorati rank is progressing
12. Facebook: Social media app to keep in touch with friends and family

Now that I’ve identified the top websites that I visit daily, I now need to time-manage each to make my day more streamlined / effective. Would love to hear of any tools or techniques that other people use.

How many sites are your “Must-Visit” website list?

What is Stumble Upon?
Stumble Upon is a social bookmarking online site that allows you to share websites with friends using the Stumble Upon browser toolbar. If you like a website you’re looking at, simply press the “Thumbs Up” button; if you don’t like it, “Thumbs Down”. If it’s exceptional or you’d like to add your opinion on the site for others to see, press the review button to leave a comment.

The name “Stumble Upon” is derived from the ability to Stumble through websites that are filtered via keywords/tags/categories that you have selected. For example, some of the categories that I have opted-in for are technology, science, internet and photography. So when I press the Stumble! button, it will show me websites that other people have bookmarked that are in these categories.

For me, this is more efficient than finding a website, then having to copy and paste into an email – with Stumble Upon I can do this all within a browser. It also provides the extra advantage of keeping a history of your favorite sites and sites that you liked.

The Benefits of Stumble Upon
I must say that the Stumble Upon experience has been very rewarding; I’ve connected up with similar minded people and discovered some amazing websites. It’s also given me an avenue to promote my own blogs a little too.

My Stumble Upon Statistics @ Aug 2008
Even though I signed up last year, I’ve only been actively using Stumble Upon for 3 months. My current stats of today are:
- Likes 1,920 pages
- Likes 94 videos
- Likes 136 photos
- Has 158 fans
- Received 40 reviews

The tally above is evidence that once you’ve started Stumbling it hard to stop!

7 Tips for New Stumble Upon Users / Stumblers
I’ve asked a couple of my good Stumble friends to help me compile a list of tips for newbies. This list was created to make your Stumble Upon experience as rewarding and effective as possible from the onset.

1. Don’t spam others with your own website content: this advice was consistent amongst all my friends – nobody likes spam of any sort, regardless of how good it is. Keep promotion of your own site to at max 1 per day. Even this may cause others to block you so be careful.

2. Don’t just thumbs up your own website: people on Stumbe Upon are quite web savvy and can generally tell a person’s movitivations by what they bookmark/thumbs up. If people see a list of Stumbles with the same domain name, don’t expect to make a lot of friends or get fans fast. Stumble Upon is a community trying to build up a quality collection of website links and users – thumbing your own all the time is contrary to this.

3. Incorporate Stumble Upon into your Daily Website surfing routine: We all ues the web. Using Stumble Upon just makes the process more intelligent especially for keeping a repository of favorite sites. So when you find something you like or don’t like, make sure you Thumbs Up or Down and use the “Send to” feature to send to Stumbler friends. Before you know it, it’ll become automatic. I try to bookmark and thumbs up at least 10 per day.

4. Stumble through your friends favorites daily: If you’ve made some friends on Stumble, press the friends button then you’ll see that your Stumble Button will from that point just stumble through your friends favorites. Don’t forget to review the stuff you really like as well.

5. Make meaningful friendships: I must admit when I first joined SU, I was adding people like there was no tomorrow. I am now far more selective and only add people who genuinely want to be a friend, share similar tastes in websites and are active. This way I know that my Stumbles aren’t going into an abyss when I send cool links across.

Some great friends that I’ve made on Stumble Upon and people who’ve contributed to this post are:

- Dominic (http://domfosnz.stumbleupon.com)
- TopSurf (http://topsurf.stumbleupon.com)
- Lainie (http://lainiep.stumbleupon.com)
- Chris (http://u02cdh.stumbleupon.com)
- Abbiejoice (http://abbiejoice.stumbleupon.com)

Stumble through their pages and I guarantee you’ll see some interesting stuff!

Oh and Add Me if you haven’t already (mrgadgetoz.stumbleupon.com)

6. Nurture relationships on Stumble Upon: Once you’ve made a friend, don’t just leave them there alone! I recommend you send them a welcome message then look out for their new stumbles. Send stuff that you know that they will particularly be interested in and you’ll find in most cases they will reciprocate. I find another way to show you value someone’s contributions on Stumble Upon is to write a review on their Stumble Upon profile. It’s amazing how far a sentence or two can go. Try it.

7. Personalize your profile: Get a decent headshot or interesting photo to set you apart from the pack. Update your likes and add some information about yourself. This always makes someone’s Stumble Upon page more interesting. And of course, change up the color scheme to suit your style. We all know how interesting it is to stare at a default-white profile…NOT!

At the end of the day, remember that Stumble Upon is a community that seeks to gather a collection of quality websites. Align yourself with this cause and have fun!

STUMBLE UPON WEBSITE

Would love to hear if you have any more tips and advice. Please add your comment below