Whether you think Twitter is the greatest thing since egg slicers or you think it's just another dumb way to waste time on the internet, there's one thing that makes Twitter extraordinarily helpful: real-time search. While Google does a pretty good job of letting you find maps of South Dakota, the best place to buy a digital camera, or other the latest news from Washington, Twitter search can help you figure out what people are talking about right now.

For instance, if you wanted to figure out whether you were the only person experiencing a Google outage yesterday, all you had to do was look at Twitter. Or a few weeks ago you could find out exactly what people thought about the new Star Trek movie seconds after the surprise premiere in Austin.

Twoogle is a tool that provides the best of both worlds, but letting you search both Google and Twitter at the same time. Just enter a search term, and Twoogle will provide results in a split-screen format, with Twitter search listings on the left and Google on the right.

The only problem I have with Twoogle is that Google doesn't look great when you squash the window, since you wind up providing roughly equal space to search results and sponsored links. But if you have a higher resolution monitor this shouldn't be a problem. FYI, the screenshot above was made using Google Chrome on a 1280 x 800 pixel display.