Let the onslaught begin.

Today Twitter unleashed their new “live-streaming” API, which enables users a totally new way to enjoy the micro-blogging service sweeping the world. For users who access twitter through the multi-account capable, user-friendly app Tweetdeck, there is a new API option called “User Streams” that is now in “a limited testing period”. Keep in mind: there are an estimated 3,000 tweets sent per second.

All the features of Twitter you know and love will now be streamed in real-time, including the user timeline (your main account), direct messages, retweets, new followers, favorites and even additions to lists. By taking these updates into real-time, Twitter is continuing to reach it’s full potential as an information delivery service. Now without refreshing, reloading or any action at all on the part of the user, you can watch Twitter flow like the beautiful river of information that it truly is.

Users hungry for the action can either pay $20 for a registered version of Echofon for Mac, or sign up for one of Tweetdeck’s preview releases. Until you get your hands on this to see it for yourself, there’s this blistering fast preview video  that will give you an impression of how exactly Twitter will be the newest and truest incarnation of the “real-time web”.