Today we're announcing a product that is a major step toward making Twitter more easily accessible by people around the world - the Twitter Translation Center. The Translation Center allows us to crowdsource translations from our passionate users in order to more quickly launch Twitter in additional languages.

Translators will be translating the product itself, not the Tweets. If you go to the settings page on Twitter.com and change your language, you’ll see what we mean.

We currently offer Twitter in English, French, German, Italian, Japanese, Korean, and Spanish. These languages are all included in the Translation Center so translators can continue to help us with updates. We’ve also added Indonesian, Russian and Turkish to the Translation Center, as Twitter will be translated to those languages next. We plan to introduce more languages throughout the year, such as Portuguese.

Crowdsourcing translations isn’t new for us. Since October, 2009, we’ve counted on Twitter users to volunteer as translators and help us localize Twitter. For this launch, we created a completely new system, based on feedback from translators, to improve the translation experience.


How does it work?
The new Translation Center allows any Twitter user to sign up, choose a language and begin translating immediately. Translators can now help localize twitter.com, mobile.twitter.com, Twitter for iPhone and iPad, Twitter for Android, Twitter Help and the Twitter Business Center. We also improved the Center’s search functionality, added phrase tagging, created special translator profiles, enabled commenting on phrases and much more.

At this time, we have opened up the Translation Center to users who speak French, Indonesian, Italian, German, Japanese, Korean, Russian, Spanish, and Turkish. If you speak any of these languages, you can start helping us translate! Head over to twitter.com/translate and follow @translator for the latest updates.

Twitter for Android is one of the fastest growing Twitter applications. Six months ago, it wasn’t among the top 10 most-used Twitter applications. However, in the last two months, usage has doubled, and now it’s among the top five – along with twitter.com, m.twitter.com (our mobile web site), Twitter for iPhone and Twitter for Blackberry.

Today, we’re launching a new version of Twitter for Android. It looks and feels more like our other official Twitter applications and provides a more consistent experience across platforms and devices.

Use Twitter without signing in
You can use Twitter for Android even if you haven’t signed in or don’t have an account. You can view trends, browse your interests and see suggested users in several categories, including fashion, entertainment and travel, or search to find out what people are saying about topics you care about, such as big sporting events. You can now also sign up for Twitter from within the app.


Design
We made some significant changes in the design of the new app. When you first sign in, you’ll see your timeline, along with icons along the top that let you view @mentions, messages, and lists. This layout makes it fast and simple to navigate Twitter on your Android device. Also, the @mentions tab now includes Retweets; seeing replies and Retweets in one place offers a quick way to better understand which Tweets are sparking interest and engagement. In addition, we introduced auto-complete for usernames.


Search
We’ve also introduced universal search to this version of Twitter for Android. This means that when you search, you can find Tweets with the term you’re looking for, Tweets sent by people near your location, or people whose user names include that term.

For example, let’s say you want to search for “packers". As you type “packers” in the search box, you’ll see the following suggestions:

• search packers: this will return Tweets that include the word “packers”
• search packers nearby: this will return Tweets that include the word “packers” and are sent by nearby users
• search packers in people: this will return accounts that have “packers” in the name
• @packers: this option will skip search results and take you directly to the account, if it exists (in this example, it does)

And, last but not least, at the bottom of the search section is one of my favorite new features: you can scan your address book to find which of your friends, who have chosen to be discoverable, are also on Twitter. New users will get a chance to do this when they first go through the sign-up process on the app.

You can download Twitter for Android from Android Market on devices with Android 2.1 or higher.

A record 162.9 million people watched this year’s Super Bowl, making it the most-watched television event ever.

The big event had its own Twitter record, too. If you tweeted at 10:07:16pm EST, you helped set a new Twitter record: during the final moments of the game, fans sent 4,064 Tweets per second (TPS) – the highest TPS for any sporting event. That spike shattered the previous record in the sporting world: the 3,283 TPS sent during Japan’s 3-1 victory over Denmark during last summer’s World Cup. In fact, Twitter users shattered that record six times over the course of the game – including early touchdowns by the Packers and Steelers and throughout the halftime show. (Still, all of this Super Bowl tweeting wasn’t enough to top the all-time record of 6,939 TPS, set just after midnight in Japan on New Year’s eve.)

The surprise winner of the Super Bowl? Usher (@UsherRaymondIV). His sudden appearance during the Black Eyed Peas’ (@bep) halftime show performance created the second largest peak in Tweets during the game. Plus, the continued talk about him made him the most talked about person during the Super Bowl. The Peas were next on the list of most-discussed people, followed by Slash, Eminem, and Christina Aguilera. Aaron Rodgers, the most mentioned player, was sixth.

So which commercials and brands were people talking about most during the game? Doritos, whose "Pug Attack" commercial was a popular favorite, was this year’s champion. Audi and Pepsi took a close second and third, followed by Chevy, Coca-Cola and Groupon.

Our goal is to instantly connect people everywhere to what is most meaningful to them. For this to happen, freedom of expression is essential. Some Tweets may facilitate positive change in a repressed country, some make us laugh, some make us think, some downright anger a vast majority of users. We don't always agree with the things people choose to tweet, but we keep the information flowing irrespective of any view we may have about the content.

Around this time of year, the conversation on Twitter turns to football –of the American variety– as people around the world begin talking about the Super Bowl.

Last year, during key moments of Super Bowl XLIV, about 40% of all Tweets were related to the game. As the game ended, this number was closer to 50%. This year, one-third of the players who were in the NFL playoffs are on Twitter. And, at some points during last Sunday’s AFC and NFC championship games, virtually all trends were football-related.

Today, we joined Visa and the NFL in announcing that we’re going to make it even easier to follow the conversation about Super Bowl XLV. Starting this morning, fans can visit www.nfl.com/visa to “Go Inside Super Bowl XLV With Visa,” a one-stop shop where they can experience Super Bowl XLV in real-time and see interesting Tweets from players, media, NFL personnel, fans and more.

The popularity of sports on Twitter isn’t unique to American football. Last summer’s World Cup set new records for the number of Tweets sent per second, and the final match represented the largest period of sustained activity for an event in Twitter’s history.

Now that we know the Pittsburgh Steelers and Green Bay Packers will play in Super Bowl XLV, the level of conversation is only going to grow. Both teams (@steelers and @packers) are active on Twitter, as are many of their star players, including James Harrison (@jharrison9292), Hines Ward (@mvp86hinesward) and Troy Polamalu (@tpolamalu) on the Steelers and Aaron Rodgers (@AaronRodgers12), Clay Matthews (@ClayMatthews52) and Nick Barnett (@NickBarnett) on the Packers.

전세계적으로 트위터의 사용이 증가하고 있는 가운데, 작년에 가장 빠른 성장세를 보인 국가 중 하나가 바로 대한민국입니다. 한국에서 지난 1년간 트위터의 사용자 수는 무려 10배가 증가 하였습니다.

오늘, 트위터는 한국 사용자들에게 더욱 가까이 다가갑니다. 먼저, 트위터 웹사이트인 Twitter.com과 트위터의 모바일 웹사이트를 한국어로 만나보실 수 있습니다.

한국 사용자들은 한글 트위터를 이용해 보다 쉽게 본인에게 의미가 있는 사용자들과 연결되고 소통할 수 있게 되었습니다. 실제로 이미 많은 한국 이용자들이 트위터에서 활약중입니다.

• 소설가 이외수(@oisoo)님의 트윗은 특유의 촌철살인 풍자로 이외수 트위터 어록을 남길만큼 인기를 모으고 있고, 작년에는 이를 모아 출간한 에세이 단행본이 베스트셀러가 되기도 하였습니다.
• 영화배우 박중훈(@moviejhp)님은 트위터를 통해 배우라는 직업에 대한 생각과 일상을 공유하며, 팬들과 직접 소통하고 있습니다.
• 방송계에서는 MC겸 개그맨 김제동(@keumkangkyung)님과 MBC 기자겸 앵커 김주하(@kimjuha)님이 큰 호응을 얻고 있고,
• 슈퍼주니어 멤버들도 트위터 전세계 실시간 트렌드 차트에 오르내리며 한국 가수들의 인기를 증명하고 있습니다. (@donghae861015, @heedictator, @siwon407, @shinsfriends, @special1004, @allrisesilver, @ryeong9)

이 외에도 정치, 경영, IT, 스포츠 등의 다양한 분야에서 팔로우하고 싶은 사용자들을 보려면, 관심 분야별 추천 목록을 확인해주세요. (한국 사용자 목록을 보려면, 언어 설정을 한국어로 변경해야 합니다.)



트위터 공식 안드로이드용 앱(Twitter for Android)과 공식 아이폰용 앱(Twitter for iPhone)도 한국어 버전을 업데이트 하였습니다. 또한, 실시간으로 이슈가 되고 있는 트윗을 홈페이지에서 보여주고 한메일 주소록을 이용한 친구 찾기를 용이하게 해주신 다음커뮤니케이션과 휴대전화 문자메시지로 가입자의 트위터 이용을 가능하게 해주신 LG U+(번호 #1234로 문자를 보내면 됨)의 파트너십에 감사드립니다.

기존의 트위터 사용자는 로그인 후, 본인의 계정 설정에서 언어 설정을 한국어로 변경할 수 있습니다. 트위터 본사의 최신 소식과 한국 사용자 관련 소식을 실시간으로 받아보려면 @twitter_kr을, 트위터 고객지원 공지사항을 보려면 @dowoomi를, 한국에서 실시간으로 화제가 되고 있는 인기 트윗을 보려면 @toptweets_ko를 팔로우 해주세요. 또한, 이번 한글 트위터에 대한 의견을 나눌때는 트윗에 #twitterkr를 포함하여 글을 올려 주세요.

트위터의 한국어 지원으로 이제 트위터는 7개 언어(한국어, 영어, 프랑스어, 독일어, 이탈리아어, 일본어, 스페인어)를 지원합니다. 트위터의 미국 외 사용자가 70%에 달하고 있는 관계로, 트위터는 최대한 많은 언어로 서비스를 하고자 노력하고 있으며, 올해 말까지 더 많은 언어를 지원할 예정입니다.

Twitter is proud to introduce an appropriately slick and simple desktop application for Mac computers. Twitter for Mac has launched today as part of the Mac App Store.

This app gives Twitter users another fast and convenient way to stay connected to what they care about the most. Tweets appear in real-time (using our streaming API), and the app auto-shortens URLs and has lots of useful keyboard shortcuts.

The app is also three times faster than its original version that was previously called Tweetie for Mac. Tweetie for Mac was a desktop client that was originally created by atebits developer Loren Brichter prior to our acquisition of atebits last April. Twitter for Mac is a new version updated by Loren and team during Twitter’s first Hack Week in October.

We acquired atebits with a focus on launching our own Twitter iPhone application. Since then, we’ve been asked repeatedly for a new version of Tweetie for Mac. We decided that the new version fits well into our goal of ensuring that mainstream users will have the best possible experience on popular platforms. We hope you enjoy it.

It’s time for the @NFL playoffs, and they are sure to generate more Twitter conversation than ever before. And, this year, the teams and players, themselves will have lots to say. All 12 playoff teams and a full one-third (200+) of the players in the playoffs have Twitter accounts.

To help you keep up with these teams and players, we created a list of Twitter accounts relevant to the playoffs. You can follow @drewbrees and the @Official_Saints as they try to repeat as World Champions or @MikeVick of the @eagles as he continues his comeback. The list also includes folks like @JimIrsay, owner of the @NFLColts, and @PeteCarroll, coach of the @Seahawks.

You also can receive Tweets via SMS on your phone even if you don’t have a Twitter account or a smartphone. Just text “follow [username]” - for example “follow Packers” - to 40404 in the US. (Short codes in other countries are here.)