Twitterrific, the first native Twitter client for iPhone, effectively invented key aspects of modern Twitter interaction and terminology Tweetie, perhaps the most popular Twitter client of its time, pioneered touch interaction paradigms such as pull to refresh. That was a time of astonishing innovation in mobile app design. The core Twitter experience would always be the same the design and preferences around it would differ from client to client. As a user, there was little friction in trying multiple Twitter clients: because Twitter data was always “in the cloud”, changing clients was like choosing a different outfit each day. Twitter made sense as a social network in your pocket Apple’s iPhone OS and newly launched App Store made that a reality. IPhone apps and the Twitter API were a perfect match five years ago. In the golden days of third-party Twitter apps, a good new client would come out at least every month, with several developers pitching their own ideas for what was meant to be a mobile-first communication network. The growing popularity of Twitter, an open API, and the rapid takeoff of the App Store contributed to the creation of a defining genre of mobile software in 20: the Twitter client for iPhone.
Twitter clients used to be a UI design playground.
