14 DAY TRIAL // Twitter may have started out as a conversation platform but today most people use it to keep up with current events or trends so search has become an important part of the service. Twitter's own search however still leaves some things to be desired. Twitter clients, like the recently updated Seesmic and TweetDeck, offer a way to keep up by having custom keyword searches automatically updated, acting somewhat like RSS clients but with the advantage of the real-time information. And now with the launch of TweetTabs you have the option to do the same in a web browser.
The new service comes from the makers of TweetMeme, the link tracker that has seen a big rise in popularity coinciding with Twitter's. TweetTabs makes it very simple to track popular topics on the site by showing the current trending ones but also allows users to have their own custom searches, which are then updated almost in real time. The interface is very simple yet powerful and, as the name implies, lists any number of searches in tabs. A nice feature is the possibility to preview the links in tweets by clicking on them, which brings up a small pop-up with an excerpt from the link and also an image thumbnail if available.
TweetTabs also offers the possibility to interact with the tweets by retweeting them or replying to them and you can also view the author's Twitter profile. The search columns can be rearranged as you see fit and the site will remember your searches between sessions.
While all of the functionality was available in many Twitter desktop clients some might prefer a web based solution as they may not be using their own computer. TweetTabs offers a really useful service that shows that there are still a lot of potential uses for Twitter that haven't been discovered yet.