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Yappd is a new micro-blogging tool with an emphasis on the visual.
The service works in a very similar manner to Twitter, but you can include an image in your updates, which top off at 150 characters. There's both SMS and email integration with which to do this. You can text in a picture message with a caption from your phone, or send in an email with an image attached. The image will display as a thumbnail directly in your Yappd update on your home page, which can be opened in a full size view, with your update showing below the image. You can add other Yappd users to your watchlist, and viewing their profile will show their yapps as well as those users they're following as well. There's also a "poke" feature that will send a message along to your Yappd friends to let them know you'd like to see more yapps from them.
It's easy enough to include an image with a Yappd update using your mobile phone and email. However, there are no options for including an image if you post directly from the site. This may be a feature Yappd should consider adding, as it's the site's only point of differentiation in terms of native offerings, though with the number of Twitter plug-ins available, it's still very difficult to compete. The other downside to submitting posts via email is that your email client's ads that display at the bottom of your message will be shown in your updates as well. Making it easier to find other users that you don't already know, and adding the ability to send a private message to another user would also be helpful.
Currently you cannot receive updates from friends via SMS or email, but these features are planned for release in the coming weeks.