I was just browsing through my Twitter stream and came across an article about 4 Twitter Tools for Business Research tweeted by @zaibatsu. I didn’t find the other three tools listed in that article new or interesting. However, NearbyTweets caught my eye and I gave it a try.

The site’s design is something that could be improved but, it is the value they offer that matters. The site automatically picked up a location near where I was and then proceeded to show me Twitter updates from people around me. I didn’t have to tell it where I was so that was cool–you can change the location if you want.

Since I was only on this site for about 2 minutes, I just played around with their block of Twitterers and read the stream of updates by those members. I wasn’t expecting to find anything specific–maybe someone with something interesting to say.

To my surprise, I came across a user called @largeanimal. I wasn’t sure if this was Large Animal Games–independent video game company in New York. Surely enough, this was the Twitter of Large Animal Games. The independent game development community in New York is relatively small and tight–everyone pretty much knows everyone else.

This is a tool that has great potential for finding people near you or researching what people are saying about specific keywords as you can search a specific location by keywords. It certainly beats Twitter’s  own means of finding people–or I’m just not very smart. So check out NearbyTweets and maybe you’ll find someone you know tweeting nearby!