Twitter Update Preservation Society

[NB: This society doesn't actually exist, I've just made it up.]

Realistically this post could have been easily summarised in 140 characters on Twitter, and the discussion spread out across a collection of updates, however in light of the fact I want to document the responses for reference later I thought I’d devote a post to it instead.

One of the issues I’m finding with Twitter – even when using hashtags – is the fact many services only track Tweets for a certain period of time before they no longer show up in search results.  Therefore in order to retain access to hashtag discussions for a longer duration – ideally in perpetuity – it would seem that a different means of aggregating and syndicating Twitter updates is necessary.

For example, with #CCK09 and #ECI831 currently underway, there is already a plethora of activity and discussion emerging – much of it containing some valuable sources of information, references to resources, and even revealing trends that may not be immediately apparent or visible until later.  It would be really handy to retain a record of this – and perhaps even start to organise, interpret and repurpose the data.

What I’m hoping to hear from people are recommendations on existing sites or tools that provide this sort of service. Is there such a thing?

Otherwise it might turn out that we need to start looking towards establishing a syndication framework such as the combination WordPress/Feed WordPress plugin, which pulls in content from disparate sources and republishes it in another space.  That way we’d be able to retain Twitter discussions long after they’ve faded into the ether elsewhere.

Problem is, WordPress may not necessarily be the most ideal solution for this scenario because it’s meant for more long-form content.

On the otherhand, WordPress themes like P2 have emerged to adapt the WP framework to suit a slightly different purpose:

“A group blog theme for short update messages, inspired by Twitter. Featuring: Hassle-free posting from the front page. Perfect for group blogging, or as a liveblog theme. Dynamic page updates.”

Realistically one of the themes that has chararcterised the lifecycle of Twitter thus far is its organically evolving nature – largely in the wake of innovated usage trends amongst the user base.  From my recollection at least, use of the @ symbol to signify a reply to someone was inspired by the habits of users; likewise hashtags were as well.

In the case of tracking past updates, perhaps this is another element that Twitter was not originally conceived to do – with its primary focus being maintained on what is happening right now, and the trends that are emerging as we speak, rather than one has been said some time ago.  Yet this organically evolving nature is also an extraordinary opportunity to analyse and review the trends that emerge over time, and we’re only going to be able to do that if we continue to have ready access to the updates.

So after saying all this, I’m encouraging everyone to throw their ideas into the pot. 

What do you use to retain Twitter updates?  What could we use to preserve hashtag discussions?