Twitter Keeps Your iPhone Contacts

Calling all Twitterratics, new updates for your iPhone Twitter app have just been released. Some of the updates include abilities to copy and paste texts, change font settings and copy or email tweets. The app has also been updated for Android mobile devices and Amazon’s Kindle. The updates for Twitter for iPhone will now be available once Apple starts to sell iPhone 4S app for Twitter 4.1. Twitter for iPhone fans should be happy to find out that most of the criticisms from the last update were addressed.

Features and Fixes

One of the major upgrades that Twitter fans should welcome on their iPhones is the Quick Swipe. Quick Swipe is a feature previously intact in the app’s original name, Tweetie. This enables the user to see selectable options for your tweet after swiping it. Now iPhone Twitter fans can reply, re-tweet, favorite and share tweets without leaving the timeline. The iPhone app update also included the return of text copying and pasting from tweets and user profiles, making it easier for users to tweet and copy. It also features binding options where you can tweet, email or copy the link with options to save it for later reading via Instapaper or Read It Later service. Twitter for iPhone also featured a better and safer “Find Friends” where the app uses your contact lists to detect friends who are on Twitter but warns the user first and asks for confirmation before accessing your contact list. This addressed rumors that Twitter keeps a person’s contact numbers for 18 months without the user even knowing it. The update also includes Direct Access Pass and a new language option (Turkish). You can now also change the font sizes and see a user’s profile once the user follows you. Twitter has also improved direct messaging, startup, image quality and accessibility.

A Failed Upgrade

Twitter people have chattered long and hard about the failed previous upgrade done by the company. Though not technically ‘failed’ in terms of execution, the reception among iPhone owners who rely on their iPhone 4S to keep up with tweets and biz were not so good. Twitter for iPhone users have protested the company’s use of mobile clients like Tweetbot instead of relying on the site’s native one. Also, users think that Twitter simplified the app so much that it lost all the functionalities that the iPhone users needed, removing good characteristics and leaving the user groping their way out of Twitterdom.  Functions like copy-paste and Quick Swipe (which have been there ever since the app was called Tweetie) were also removed. This means that if you preferred to open a tweet you’d have to tap it and open it in a new pane. Important things like direct messaging were also said to be buried deep down the folds which made it not so accessible and user-friendly. Other users also felt like the old Twitter for iPhone upgrade made it look cut off from the Twitter they use on desktops. This was because it looked more boxy than rounded. The conversations were said to have ‘looked disconnected’ which made a lot of iPhone users want to sell iPhone 4S or move on to other social media apps instead.

Listening Twitter

Much to everyone’s delight, Twitter has finally heard the qualms of their long time users. While the previous upgrade made Twitter look too simple and cozy, it also alienated its long time followers because of the removal of functions and features that were helpful to everyday tweeting. The previous upgrade was also said to be ‘too confusing’ and condescending. Since users have been gurgling with hate on Twitter’s interface, Twitter finally addressed most of the qualms of their followers through the new Twitter update including the Quick Swipe and other tweeting functions. They also addressed the heavy complaints regarding a recent report that they, along with other social media apps, have been keeping users’ contact lists for months without prior notice. This issue surfaced after Path, another social networking app, was discovered “silently uploading iPhone users’ address books to its servers.”

Twitter For All

The new Twitter update is also made available to other platforms such as Google’s Android OS. Twitter 4.1 is now optimized for the Android Ice Cream Sandwich OS and also Amazon Kindle Fire. It is also available for Barnes & Noble tablet family. To get Twitter’s new updates, you can now search the online stores that sell iPhone 4S applications and the Android Market as well.