With ThingLink, Interactive Images in Tweets
We’ve given ThingLink a lot of love here at 10,000 Words, but the easy-to-use interactive image-maker merits another post because of its new functionality: working on the Twitters.
Users can now share an image on Twitter complete with any created ThingLink meta-data, and it’s all accessible in the tweet itself. That means that, for better or worse, a new level of engagement and storytelling is possible right in the platform of Twitter. A user doesn’t have click to a new page to see a ThingLink’d image. And a tweet can now contain a short bit of text, an image and several, several links.
Here’s an example of a popular White House photo making its way around the net this weekend. You’re probably already seen it. If not, I explain using ThingLink’s own features.
Here’s that image ThingLink’d and working directly in a tweet:
(Note that to make a ThingLink’d image work in a tweet, you currently have to share the interactive directly from ThingLink. The tools creators’ explain in this blog post.)
Neat, huh? Pair this type of functionality addition to Twitter with how the service is now more prominently highlighting top pics and videos, and you have a strong case to say that the Twitter game may be a-changin’. At the very least, storytelling via a tweet is expanding beyond the original 140 character limit. As such, strategy may want to accomodate for the change.
“Not impressed” about how useful the tool could be, even removed from a Twitter stream? Here’s one of our posts about how to use ThingLink for journalism. Here’s one about combining ThingLink with Easel.ly, a combo for quick interactive infographics.
Got an idea for how to best use ThingLink for journalism on Twitter? Feel free to start brainstorming below, or hey, on Twitter, with your own ThingLink’d image nestled in a tweet.
