Awhile back, I began noticing many of the people I follow on Twitter, tweeting traffic problems, and using the hashtag #jhbtraffic. I thought it was pretty interesting, so I went onto Twitter and a did a search for #jhbtraffic. I found there were loads of people tweeting with that hashtag. So what I’ve now done is to create a saved search for #jhbtraffic, and I check it regularly. I’ve also begun tweeting my own traffic problems using that hashtag.
The problem is, when using Twitter from your cellphone, that their mobile website doesn’t include a place where you can view your saved searches (or search for anything in general). So you need a decent Twitter client for your phone that supports this feature. If you’re on Windows Mobile, check out PockeTwit—it supports saved searches through what it calls “groups.” On the desktop, I use TweetDeck, which is a really amazing client that also supports saved searches. I hear there’s an iPhone version of TweetDeck as well, but I can’t speak to what it can do.
It is unfortunate, though, that Twitter (or any client I’ve seen so far) doesn’t support the ability to filter out certain hashtags from your timeline. I’m sure I really irritate those of my followers not in Johannesburg sometimes! It would be nice if they could elect to not show tweets from me with the tag #jhbtraffic. Perhaps we should suggest that as a feature to Twitter?
I’m sure there are hashtags for every other metropolitan area in South Africa (and probably other countries too). I would highly recommend taking a look!
