I am addicted to Twitter. There, I said it, admitting it is the first step, right? Over the last year, posting to Facebook has diminished, especially as I became more and more fascinated by Twitter. The biggest attraction is real-time news whether it’s what’s trending locally, articles about technology or startups, or conversations about my favorite topics. I love reading and consuming what’s going on, even if I do most of my reading late at night and into the wee hours of the morning.

I love sharing information and the conversations around various hashtags opens my mind to different ideas. During the work day, I limit information consumption so I can power through my to do list and have productive meetings. Yet the minute I get a free moment I’m compelled to check the feed to see what’s going on. Does anyone else feel this way? Hidden obsessive-compulsive tendencies?

It’s ok, if you don’t follow me. I tweet up to a hundred times a day which can be overwhelming to a casual user or anyone new to Twitter.

This is what I post:

• Content from startup or social media events.
• Content I’m reading, using Twitter to “bookmark” since it’s automagically backed up on Backupify.
• Conversations on the following hashtags: #startup, #leanstartup, #smcphx, #socialmedia, #UFC, #phxlatenite
• Random thoughts throughout the day.
• Checkins on Gowalla/Foursquare/Facebook/Google+

Here are the mobile Twitter apps I use for iPhone:

• Echofon – my favorite for browsing the feed and having twitter conversations.
• Smartr – to read articles tweeted by people I follow without the noise of the conversations.

Hootsuite – to schedule articles and shorten links.

• Tweetdeck – to post tweets longer than 140 chars, it’s laggy on my device so I use it very rarely.
• Twitter – I use this the least and can’t figure out why I haven’t deleted it.

What are your favorite Twitter apps? Who else is addicted to Twitter?

Image credit: Steve Rhodes