Reportage is yet another Twitter application for the iPhone and iPod Touch. Except, this Twitter app puts a unique spin on how you read your tweets. Some may hate it, others may love it. Regardless, it's a new, refreshing way to use Twitter.

The app opens in the "world" page, which presents all your tweets from a predefined time limit in a grid form, displaying avatars and badges that let you know how many tweets that particular person has sent out. For instance, each person listed will only show the profile picture and a number of tweets they have sent out in a specific amount of time. When you tap on the avatar, a new screen will display a scrolling list of tweets from only that profile. This makes it really easy to keep track of what a particular person has tweeted throughout the day. At this same screen, you can quickly scroll through the timeline of other profiles listed at the bottom of the screen. Otherwise, you have to keep going back to the world screen to select a new profile. When using this method, it takes a little too long to load the tweets, which gets annoying. It's must faster to scroll through the profiles listed at the bottom of the screen. Tapping on a tweet will bring up a full screen of standard Twitter options including reply, resend, message, and star. Star will set the current profile as a favorite. You can then access a separate page of only favorite profiles. There is also an info screen that displays the specifics about a profile such as followers and following. Something this app lacks is the ability to email a tweet. I want to say this is something minor, but there are many times when I actually want to email myself a tweet I see so I can look at it later.

The world screen allows you to send a tweet, refresh the page, and navigate the tabs. As stated above, you can access your favorite profiles using the stars tab. There is also a local tab that will bring up profiles within a one, five, or fifteen mile radius. This tab, just like all tabs, must be manually refreshed. The final tab is your own profile. This screen will display all of your own tweets, public replies, or private messages, each of which are color coded.

Reportage may be customized from the iPhone's settings page. You can set the initial tweet load amount ranging from 10 to 100. Time range that tweets go back to can be set to 1, 3, 6, 12, or 24 hours. There are also three on/off toggles for world on launch, replies on launch, and user timelines. There are no options for custom color schemes or font sizes.

There is no doubt that Reportage has brought about a fresh new way of managing your Twitter account on the iPhone and iPod Touch. The UI is beautifully done with small animations here and there that are definitely appreciated. My only major complaint is the load times. It takes just a bit too long for the initial world screen to open up and for each profile to list its tweets. Sometimes when I check my tweets, I only have a few minutes and waiting for tweets to load is just not an option. In addition, the app is missing several features that are becoming a standard in Twitter apps such as trends, email, and search. But, I'm sure the developer will put out an update adding these key components. When that happens, the app will certainly earn a five star rating. As it is now, I don't think it will replace my current Twitter app, but I still think it's definitely worth the price and I strongly recommend checking it out.