LONDON: Twitter opens access to some of the publishing tools it’s using internally for Moments, including an immersive display for Web embeds.
Online publishers are about to get a lot more options for embedding tweets in their stories, with Twitter announcing a new “ecosystem” of products around embedded tweets today at its Flight developer conference.
The curation side of that ecosystem includes existing Twitter products like TweetDeck and Curator, which helps publishers find the best tweets to feature in their content. Curator was first announced in March.
It also includes partnerships with companies like Spredfast, Wayin, Dataminr, ScribbleLive and Flowics. Twitter’s Michael Ducker said that these are the same tools that Twitter uses to create its Moments, which pull tweets together around big news stories and trends. Twitter has done significant work to connect these products, so it’s not just a bunch of separate integrations, Ducker said.
Twitter is also introducing a new tool for creating embeddable grids of Twitter content. So if you’re tired of just publishing a stack of tweets, one on top of the other, you can also try presenting them in a grid format, like the example below. (I’m guessing it works best for video- and image-driven tweets.)
In a blog post about its publisher announcements, Twitter said it has “big plans” for the Twitter Publish site. Right now it’s just for creating embedded grids, but it could become “a one stop shop where you can easily preview all of the different types of displays we offer in Twitter Kit and grab the embed code for any Twitter content you’d like to publish.”
In his presentation, Ducker argued that embedded tweets have become the “modern day pull quote” and said Twitter’s aim is to turn them into a “material part” of publishers’ businesses. He also said they’re not just for news publishers — companies Angry Bird-maker Rovio have used them, as well. Embedded tweets don’t even have to be limited to websites and apps. Ducker also announced a partnership with JCDecaux to bring tweets to out-of-home digital displays.
