Seesmic has been on a roll with steady updates and providing unique as well as intuitive ways to manage and update your Twitter and Facebook stream. There latest line-up now includes Seesmic Web, a browser client. The Seesmic browser client was officially released to the public (due to embargoes) at the TechCrunch real-time web event CrunchUp among other services. So is the Seesmic Web client as good as it claims to be? Let’s find out.
Performance
The Seesmic web client is blazingly fast. After the initial onslaught of visitors the Seesmic web client had after CrunchUp it has not faltered since. It has officially blown Tweetvisor and Peoplebrowsr out of the water in terms of performance. This includes load times as well as using specific functions such as search, replying and updating your Twitter status.
User Interface
Pros:
The user interface has a very Google like feel to it. All the functions are laid out quite clearly in a neat manner while remaining minimal and keeping the focus on what you are using the client for, tweets. Hovering over a Twitter user automatically brings up the reply option with an arrow with further options to RT and/or direct message.
Hovering over a profile picture for a few seconds will also bring up a few features, such as the option to unfollow, message or visit the Twitter users profile as well as the number of followers/followings. Clicking on a profile page will open up the profile biography and status updates within the web client.
You also have the option to switch views to read tweets. You can either view your tweets in multiple column views or in a single column view which displays your tweets in an almost email like fashion. This makes it easy to quickly look over tweets without all the extra features and scrolling.
Direct messaging has also gotten a major over haul. Direct Messaging has essentially gotten its own client within a client. By clicking on the messages button up top you can get a quick overview of all your DM’s. Clicking on the DM’s will pop-up a seperate column with the messages that are threaded to help you keep track of the conversation. You are also notified when you get a DM from one of your followers.
Cons:
The UI has some very random quirks to it. One of the major random quirks is direct messaging. The Seesmic web client treats direct messages like e-mail, creating a whole seperate interface for the DM functionality. There is no option to simply add DM’s to the main column view. While I like the seperate messaging aspect of the Seesmic Web client sometimes I just like a quick overview rather than clicking on a whole seperate aspect of the client itself.
Final Thought
The Seesmic web client is an awesome product that deserves a lot of praise. Loic Le Meur and his team have balanced a rich feature set, simplicity and performance very well. While the client definitely is in beta stage it has a lot of things going right for it. Already I am seeing my followers switch over to the Seesmic web client and praising how well it works.
Great move team Seesmic, Tweetdeck, your turn.
