Future of Twitter: App toolkits?

This morning oneforty, previously billed as "Twitter's missing app store," introduced the first of its community-powered toolkits. These tooklits give users the power to bundle recommended apps for targeted types of interests, businesses, and even regions. According to the company's announcement:

Companies, non-profits, and cause-based groups can share the apps they use to manage their Twitter presence. Fitness buffs can list the Twitter tools that help keep their training on track. And iPad fans can share the best Twitter apps for the iPad with their fellow early adopters.

The toolkits are akin to Twitter lists, which raged with popularity when first announced. Twitter lists give users the ability to create groups of Twitter users according to any type of demographic they set, and then publish that group so that others may subscribe and benefit from the value of the network. Oneforty's app toolkits allow the site's tens of thousands of members to do the same by grouping applications into recommended toolkits to which others can subscribe, and then implement according to their preferred use.

As every member will be able to create a toolkit, which could potentially create some noise, oneforty plans to spotlight various theme-based toolkits and even highlight which toolkits are trending (similar to topic trends on Twitter). Users should also strongly consider starting with the toolkits developed or recommended by those in their own trusted networks in order to help combat some of the noise.

Here are some examples of already created toolkits:

• Twitter Indispensable Tools by Guy Kawasaki
• Essential PR Tools by Steve Rubel
• Cancer Killing Chemo Toolkit by Drew Olanoff
• Brand New to Twitter? by Twitter for Dummies
• Starter Apps for Nonprofits on Twitter by Beth Kanter
• Must-Haves for Startups by Greenhorn Connect

Other fun toolkits already developed include recommended locational Twitter apps as well as those targeted at sports fans. There's even one for joining the conversation about wine from Vintank, the wine industry's digital think tank.

As applications have been a strong sideline business to Twitter itself, some might say that Twitter is less than valuable without all of the applications to help to maximize the experience. And while Twitter continues to elevate the feature set found on Twitter web, the slowing growth of visits to the Twitter site could indicate that more people are relying on applications versus the inflexible Web interface.

The industry has long speculated -- and awaited -- Twitter's official foray into business accounts, which seems to be slowly yet not-so-surely coming. Oneforty is offering an advancement in Twitter for business that Twitter itself might be missing. Oneforty is allowing users to go beyond recommending merely sources but showing at a very baseline the grouping of tools that have proven to be successful for some users and companies. Of course, the usual mantra is that the tools are nothing without the right strategy, but at least now there will be some easily accessible examples of tool mixtures with a good track record.

Beyond this baseline opportunity, it's even possible that oneforty could allow companies to offer branded toolkits as part of their strategic offerings, or even create a feature for people to embed their toolkit recommendations into their company Web sites. According to Laura Fitton, oneforty founder and CEO, this idea isn't entirely out of the question.

"In the future we may offer consultants, etc., the ability to have 'private' toolkits. For example if they want to publish proprietary methods/approaches. Over time toolkits will have deeper functionality - i.e., as a widget that sits anywhere on the web," she said.

Visit the oneforty site to view toolkits or create your own.