Archives for posts with tag: twitter

The Lie That Will Ultimately Kill Facebook

January 10, 10 //
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Yesterday, Facebook founder and CEO Mark Zuckerberg spoke to an audience at the TechCrunch Crunchie awards about privacy and their descision to automatically make all content open and publicly available by default.

His statement and reasoning is that privacy is no longer a “social norm”.  Essentially that we should assume everything we say and do will be made publicaly available.

Bullshit.

This is an all-out lie, plain and simple.

The reasoning for Facebook to open up their content – and actually their users content – to the public is about money and nothing else.

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Brilliant Move by Twitter: Allowing Big 3 to DataMine

October 9, 09 //
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It came to light today that Twitter is in talks with Google and Microsoft (and by default, Yahoo!) that would allow open access to Twitter’s Data feed.

The aparent non-exclusive deal that Twitter is signing would allow the Search Engine Heavyweights to display and monetize twitter results along side of regular search engine results.

This is an absolute brilliant move by Twitter on multiple fronts; Establishing a foothold in the “real time” search realm, monetizing their extremely popular service, and also reducing future possible development costs.

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Why Twitter is Significant

August 7, 09 //
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Twitter LogoIt seems lately that on almost a weekly basis I get asked or overhear someone talking about how they don’t understand what the all fuss is about Twitter.

At first Glance, this is a rather obvious and understandable statement.  After all, what can you REALLY do with 140 characters?  Just take a look at this article on CNN Money as a perfect example of this mis-understanding.

The problem is that people are viewing Twitter at face value… a free, easy to use service that asks the simple question - ”What are you doing?” – in 140 characters or less.

But wait… did you catch that?  Those four little words in the previous sentence:

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Is Twitter the Google-Killer we’ve been looking for?

May 10, 09 //
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Twitter Replacing GoogleThere are literally hundreds of thousands of articles on, about, or around Twitter.  Most of them have to do with the communication side of things.

It is a change-agent to the way we communicate and consume information from person-to-person.

However, what most people don’t realize is Twitter’s real future, may lie in search… in one form or another.  More info after the jump.

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A Revenue Model (or two) for Twitter

December 24, 08 //
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Unless you’ve been living under the proverbial rock for the past year or so, you’ve probably realized that Twitter has been one of the biggest influences on web culture in years.  It’s changed the way we communicate, how we think scaling applications, and launched countless startups based on it’s api.

Now, there have been countless blog posts, articles, and essays on this subject, so I’m obviously not breaking any ground here.  But, I thought it would be interesting to put my own two cents into the mix and propose a revenue model of my own.

Build Now, Pay Later

One thing Twitter hasn’t been able to nail down (at least publicly) is a revenue model.   They’re the poster-child of the web 2.0 “build now, monetize later” strategy so typical of startups in the past few years.  But, in today’s economy, this simply won’t fly.

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Twitter Updates It’s Design!… But Still No Search?

September 20, 08 //
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Well Well Well… I logged in to Twitter this afternoon to go on a little rant about the new McCain campaign ads and got a nice little suprise… Twitter updated it’s interface.

UI and AJAX

Most of the changes in the interface center around the navigation elements, and I have to say they are definately an improvement.  I especially like the Following, Followers, and Updates section on the top right hand side.   Because, if you’re like me… that’s the first thing you look at when you log on.  It’s always a nice little ego boost (or killer) when it changes.

They also added a few back-end performancing enhancements in the form of AJAX additions.  While this isn’t a big improvement, every little addition counts.

Be Different… Like Everyone Else.

In addition to the AJAX and navigation additions, they also included some improved design customizations as well.  Aside from the normal “add your own background images” (which never worked well), they added a few pre-made background designs to help liven up your profile. (more…)

Lifecasting as an Organic “About Us” Page.

September 18, 08 //
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With the relatively recent popularity of “lifecasting” applications, there’s been a lot of discussion in the Blog community lately about the future of the “traditional” blog medium. Many argue that blogging has lost it’s social roots and with the popularity of applications such as Twitter and Plurk, the medium may be well on it’s way to being obsolete. Below are a few notes on my position of this discussion and a possible new concept I’ve been experimenting with.

A Complement, Not A Replacement

First and foremost, I think it’s rather ridiculous to think that an application such as Twitter will ever take the place of a blog. In my opinion, lifecasting applications work more like post-it notes in 140 characters or less… not a conversation like blogging is. And yes, you could have a conversation on an application like Twitter… but, have you ever tried it? It’s virtually impossible to keep up with the constant stream of information.

That being said, I do believe that lifecasting is and will be an important part of the blogging medium. Not as a replacement, but as a complement. It’s another way of connecting with your audience on a more personal level. A way to not only tell your visitor who you are, but show them who you are by allowing them to follow you throughout the day. (more…)