By the features, I prefer Pownce as well. The problem is: Twitter was there first with a simple, open, and rich API that fostered amazing growth incredibly quickly. Twitter made it into numerous nation-wide publications, including I think NYT, Times, etc., and not just in the geek section either. Twitter won the majority of the community and mindshare with a much broader batch of consumers. Just the way it is.

Very good points David, I see why it is more pop now

@David That means nothing, there are countless stories of ground breaking tech wilting when competition is introduced :)

I use both. Pownce is better when you want to share more than 140 characters of text.

text message updates are great for when you aren't in the realm of wifi or near a computer. Flaws which both services have is a lack of insightful posts.

So I have been here on pownce since the beginning and a big advocate of this place, but I have to admit, I am becoming a big fan of Twitter.

part of it, frankly comes from the slowness of the pownce functionality including stuff that I would have thought would be fixed by now (i.e. I will have no idea if anyone actually replies to this, as far as I can tell, the !seanlo function is not working that well).

Furthermore, there is just something to the ease of use in twitter that really reels people in. It is functional enough for you to communicate stuff, while not having nearly the operational issues that pownce has.

That said, I continue to be an avid pownce user. partially out of loyalty to the community, but partially because it really is a pretty sweet way to share stuff.

I sincerely hope they get the operational issues sorted out because twitter really is starting to go main stream.

I also, finally (I know this is longwinded but I think about this stuff alot), like the fact that we can have real conversations here. Which makes Pownce fundamentally different than twitter. Maybe people will eventually use both through something like Flock, or Friendfeed...

We'll see.

Very nice post Dave, and yeah, I really thought that all these slow issues would have been sorted out by now, I mean I know there are files on here, but still, it should not take this long :/

I far prefer Pownce but I use both. I think it is far easier to follow threads here. Also I tend to babble to the 144 character limit seems a bit stifling. But I think they're different and not really meant to be compared. There is room for both in one's life.

I use both - my take on twitter v/s pownce:

Twitter - 140 characters
Pownce - Unlimited

T-0 / P-2

Twitter - older more popular
Pownce - younger more adaptable

T-1 / P-3

Twitter - replies are notified to user
Pownce - replies not notified unless ser creates stream

T-2 / P-4

Twitter - interface is not so easy to use
Pownce - killer interface

T-2 / P-6 (2 points here because that is a key reason i keep coming back to pownce)

Twitter - easier to update and follow once you get the hang of it
Pownce - ease is there - but follow is a little hard to come by

T-4 / P-7

i may have missed a few points here - becuase my brain is not working

also like Heidi said - they both serve different purposes - like the themes followed here - like MVM /Desktop Thursday / tunes tuesday

that rocks and is not possible in twitter - but that is fine - we have it here and people here appreciate it!!!