Twitter For iPhone is the best Twitter iPhone app (period), so if Twitter For iPad is anywhere near as good then it’s an essential (and free) download.

Features include panes, inline video and media and various pinch and pull gestures.

Today we are bringing Tweets to a device that really lets content shine – the iPad. Twitter for iPad takes advantage of the iPad’s fluid touch interface, letting you move lots of information around smoothly and quickly – without needing to open and close windows or click buttons. There are a few things we want to point out that make this app a really fast and fun way to read real-time content.

I’m not fortunate enough (yet) to own an iPad, but if you do and have downloaded the Twitter app, please let us know your thoughts in the comments below.

In the meantime, you can read more on the official Twitter blog.

Some new updates from HootSuite today, which already was (in my opinion) the closest thing we have to a perfect Twitter client, and with each upgrade gets that little bit better. These new features – which the company has termed social relationship and support tools - aren’t going to change your world, but they’re welcome and for some users will have value.

Filters on Twitter are always useful, and HootSuite has added a choice of two – by influence (based on a user’s Klout score) and keyword. Here’s influence cranked up to a heady Klout rating of 75.

And a keyword search for links:

The former has some use but while I think filters will play an important part in the future of Twitter – if only to cut down the mounting noise (especially in trending topics and searches) – they need to built into Twitter to work properly. If I want to filter something out or in, then really I need to be given the option to make that permanent until I change my mind. Having to do it on the fly is nice, but nowhere near as useful. Especially every single time.

TweetDeck has offered this functionality since day one, of course, and I never really saw it as much more than a novelty on that platform, either. Handy for quick stream-searches, but not much else. As said, filters need to come from Twitter’s end to be a true game-changer.

HootSuite’s new Insights feature provides an overview of a given user’s social presence. An insight, if you will.

For example, here’s Copyblogger’s Brian Clark:

And here’s mine:

What’s that all about? Nice, HootSuite, nice. After all the good work I’ve done for you. You could have just hand-written in something for me like ‘very busy’ or ‘probably on Facebook, too’. Sheesh.

Finally, and really the most exciting bit of news of the lot, HootSuite confirmed that premium accounts are on the way. Don’t worry – they realise this won’t be for everybody.

Keep in mind, HootSuite will remain free for an estimated 95% of users based on current usage patterns. Meanwhile, premium users will enjoy access to extra features, high limits and prioritized support.

But for those who are happy to pay for more, what can they expect for their cash? Well:

• Unlimited social networks
• Unlimited RSS feeds
• Team members on social networks
• Advanced analytics & reports
• Expedited support

That’s all very nice, but it isn’t that nice. I hope they throw in custom (bit.ly) URLs, better block management and some other bits and pieces, too.

No news yet on price, but… if that’s all that premium means, then it’d better be very cheap. I absolutely believe there’s a market for a professional, subscription-based Twitter client, but it needs to be absolutely feature-packed and offer services and functions that none of the free clients can possibly match.

And then keep doing it, too.

Tons of new features in the latest build of HootSuite, which was released earlier today, including:

• A completely redesigned interface (which I have to say looks fantastic and gives you a lot more screen space to work with)
• A choice of three new themes (I’ve gone for Blue Steel)
• Google Analytics integration
• GeoSearch
• Drag & Drop Upload – in Chrome, Firefox and Safari, simply drag a file from the desktop to the message box and it automatically uploads and provides a shortened link
• Enhanced Facebook integration
• Twitter-style retweets (ON by default – I switched it off, but it’s nice to have the option, although I’d prefer it if this was offered each time you clicked the RT button)
• Language support
• HTML5 ensures your social streams display even faster

It all looks brilliant, and I’ve only just started playing around with the features. I particularly like the improvements they’ve made to the profile pop-ups, and everything feels really slick and modern.

What’s still missing is Bit.ly support. Maybe next time HootSuite, eh?

UPDATE: A few people have asked me how you get back the old-style retweets. Click on the Owl icon at the top-left of HootSuite, and select Settings > Preferences and uncheck the ‘use Twitter web retweets’ box.

Good times.

Download the  update directly on your iPhone or via iTunes.

(Hat tip: Mashable.)

Good news – the Seesmic for iPhone app is finally available (iTunes download – it’s free).

I like it.

Pros:

1. It’s free.
2. It’s clean, runs very quickly, and the interface is intuitive and easy-to-use.
3. Includes native and traditional retweet support (including via), which is a huge plus.
4. Support for your own bit.ly credentials.
5. It’s very Tweetie-like. This is a good thing, but the timing of this release is unfortunate given Twitter’s official successor to Tweetie, Twitter for iPhone, also came out this week. It might be a little too like Tweetie to gain a lot of market share, especially as both apps are free.
6. The Seesmic app supports Twitter, Facebook and Ping.fm. I’ve never been hugely bothered about having an ‘all in one’ aggregator for my mobile or desktop social media client – if I’m using Twitter, I’d rather the client focused its attention and resources 100 per cent on that – but the Facebook implementation here is efficient and handy if all you want is a quick look at your news feed. I don’t use Ping.fm so can’t comment there.
7. Supports multiple accounts, and also cross-posting (something which I don’t like to see but others disagree).
8. Evernote support.

I only have a couple of immediate issues. One, when you close the app and re-open it, it doesn’t remember exactly where you were. It knows that you were in Facebook or Twitter, and puts you back there, but on the latter it always starts on the home feed, and not where you left it (i.e., replies or in a list). This is something Tweetie does very well, and it’s a small but niggling oversight.

My second concern is from a marketing perspective. When you submit a tweet using the Seesmic iPhone app, it’s labelled simply ‘Seesmic’. For me, I would expect (and prefer) to see ‘Seesmic for iPhone’, and for Seesmic, I would think they would want to do this to benefit from the marketing exposure. Maybe I’m unusual, but when I see new clients in tweet information, I always check them out. As it is now, the vast majority of users will see ‘Seesmic’ and think nothing has changed. There’s an opportunity for growth there that I think might have been overlooked.

(You can suggest improvements and tweaks through a special feedback page that Seesmic has started.)

Seesmic founder Loic Le Meur (@loic) has recorded his usual enthusiastic video:

Overall, this is recommended. It’s not quite as slick as Tweetie/Twitter for iPhone, but there are a couple of extras here that should have some appeal, notably the support for old-style retweets and the Facebook implementation.