I have, in the past, characterized reading my Twitter feed as trying to drink from a fire hose.  The flow of information is overwhelming.  I have approximately 2,000 followers and the range of topics they discuss each and every day is unbelievable.  I enjoy grazing a few times a day - but I am only sampling and I am missing the best stuff, I am sure.

So Twitter has now integrated Twitter lists into the standard interface.  

What does that mean and why do I think it is important to you... 

My group of followers all have separate interests.  Some are interested in what I may have to say from time to time - most are just trying to build their follower lists as I did.  But there are some real gems in there and I want to hear every word they have to say.

So what I can do with Twitter lists is group some of my followers who are likely to be interested in the same thing into a list or subset of my group of followers.  So I can look at a filtered feed that will only contain those followers (or people I follow, by the way) that are likely to talk about a specific topic or set of topics.  I have a list of techies who provide me with technical data on a wide range of topics.  I have a filtered list of news and political folks.  I have a list of MLM folks in some of the programs that I am in.  I have a list of real estate leaders.

Are you beginning to get my drift ?  Twitter lists can simplify your use of Twitter and bring targeted order out of the chaos.  And it is still free. 

Twitter lists are in beta test at the moment, so give them a little slack if you encounter a growing pain.  But props to the Twitter folks for evolving and providing new tools that we are asking for in the standard interface.