socialmedian: Twitter Versus Plurk: The UI Advantage

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Source: ReadWriteWeb

Jul 31, 2008

Summary

When I first reviewed Plurk for ReadWriteWeb, I had only been using this new lifestreaming service for a little while. After using it for much longer, I've realized that there is really just one major difference between Twitter and Plurk - but it's that one difference that makes Plurk so much better.

This is a guest post by Muhammad Saleem, a social media consultant and a top-ranked community member on multiple social news sites.

If you think about the basic functionality, all micro-blogging sites offer more or less the same. You can create an account, add some friends, and then message back and forth (privately and publicly) and share stuff with each other. What Plurk does differently is the user interface and the effect of this change reverberates throughout the site. Here are the major UI changes and their impact.

1. The Timeline View

Not everyone has been happy with it but changing the way the information is displayed was a bold move, and ultimately the right one. The new layout performs exactly as expected. The timeline scrolls left to right, with the most r

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Comments (24)

Lukefrombuzzle,

Jul 31, 2008

Is Plurk still alive? I found most people have headed back to Twitter..I just seem to struggle with the way the conversations are 'hidden' unless you prompt them to open...

Rumford,

Jul 31, 2008

plurk has a funky interface but it is easier to use than twitter once you get used to it.

Antoine Bertier,

Jul 31, 2008

I have not tried Plurk, and I certainly agree that it is a bold move to change the UI everyone got used to, but from the outside the timeline does not appear to be that attractive. I guess I need to try it to be sure.

Richardk138,

Jul 31, 2008

I'm still working on making myself like plurk. It has a few pro's over twitter, like the threaded messages, but to me it seems like most people just post to it with ping.fm but never check it.

Mani Karthik,

Jul 31, 2008

Plurk is just okay, but I dont see the addictive thing on it.

Jamesbuckingham,

Jul 31, 2008

I'm a big fan of Plurk... much prefer it over Twitter and Pownce, purely for the more community feel to it. You can hold entire conversations rather than just an impersonal one-line comment here and there.

Jamesbuckingham,

Jul 31, 2008

Best thing to do is use both twitter and plurk along with ping.fm - I use that to post updates across all platforms, then conduct the conversations about it in Plurk.

Vegetarian,

Jul 31, 2008

Web2marketing,

Jul 31, 2008

the interesting thing is that there is just a very small (german) community on plurk and communication is a lot different then on twitter with hundrets of people - for me you can´t compare these two services due to complete different usage

Banane,

Jul 31, 2008

I am pretty addicted to Plurk- far more privat to me than twitter, since I'm not using hte feed anywhere. I love the interface, and I generally "think in timeliness" if that makes any sense.

Rutgerblom,

Jul 31, 2008

Intressant article. I also find Plurs UI much better than Twitters, but hey, everybody is on Twitter and nobody is on Plurk.

Charris1980,

Jul 31, 2008

i used it for about 3 days before finding tweetdeck.com and moving back to twitter. can't stand the karma system and pointless comments ppl are making just to boost their karma up.

Jonathank,

Aug 01, 2008

I find it's easy to follow conversations in Plurk over Twitter but not easy to follow replies. It's good to see Plurk is rolling out useful improvements over time.

Bpdlr,

Aug 01, 2008

Sigh, yet another micro-blog to try out

Thinkspace,

Aug 01, 2008

Interface is much better than twitters. Just because twitter has critical mass doesn't mean that plurk won't win out in the end.

Kates,

Aug 01, 2008

the thing about plurk is that they made it into something like a game. earning points and getting some sort rewards motivates people to plurk more.

Rumford,

Aug 01, 2008

the cool thing about plurk is it's ability to organize conversational thread on 1 dedicated page per plurk. nice

Banane,

Aug 01, 2008

the karma game is kinda juvenile.

Livecrunch,

Aug 01, 2008

Not bad but i still like Plurk better

Nnorris,

Aug 01, 2008

the difference between plurk and twitter

Veronicaromm,

Aug 02, 2008

Love Plurk never got into Twitter

Tinustuff,

Aug 02, 2008

Been meaning to try Plurk. Sounds like a good idea now.

Chewbocka,

Sep 05, 2008

Plurk's UI advantage won't save it when pitted against Twitter's community advantage. At least for me, everyone in my geographical area is on Twitter and not Plurk. So, it's a no-brainer.

Vincent Wright,

Sep 06, 2008

I'm still warming up to Plurk so, for right now, I'll take the energy of Twitter over the improved UI of Plurk.

Additionally, the abundance of client tools such as Twhirl make Twitter a better bargain, for me...