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Twitter Names Jack Dorsey Chief Executive
- nreece 11y agoHere's his announcement on Twitter, among other details: https://twitter.com/jack/status/651003190628872192 https://twitter.com/jack/status/651003190628872192
- scrollaway 11y agoHow... unreadable. Congratulations Twitter?
- ulfw 11y agoExactly. The never really evolving product is what hampered their growth lately.
- codingdave 11y agoWhat a perfect example of why twitter is a terrible platform for communication of all but the simplest thoughts.
- chippy 11y agoI'm sort of unsure of this generally. It's certainly changed. My examples are: The gossip and snark of say Startup L Jackson vs the gossip and snark of a valleywag post. IRC backchannels during conferences versus a Tweet Wall.
- minimaxir 11y agoThose aren't good counterarguments in favor of Twitter. Valleywag is dead because of reasons unrelated to the death of media (and I genuinely miss it). IRC backchannels are dead because IRC is dead.
- coldpie 11y ago> IRC is dead I assure you, it is not.
- airencracken 11y agoOh man. I'll have to tell Freenode that IRC is dead so they can shut down all of their servers.
- code4tee 11y agoTotally unreadable. This sums up a lot of what's wrong with Twitter. If even the CEO struggles to communicate effectively using the platform then...
- deleted 11y ago[deleted]
- criddell 11y agoDave Winer mocked up how a fat tweet could look and I think he has it right: http://scripting.com/2015/10/02/whatWouldAFatTweetLookLike.html http://scripting.com/2015/10/02/whatWouldAFatTweetLookLike.h... Obviously, they've thought of this internally too. I wonder what the point of the 140 character limit is today (I think it made sense originally).
- catshirt 11y ago"see more" link? groundbreaking stuff. someone get Twitter on the line! i know Dave deserves respect but if i was even a janitor at Twitter this post would piss me off.
- davewiner 11y agoIt wasn't written for the janitor at Twitter, rather it was for people outside Twitter who want to think about what might be coming next. Yes, it is obvious. The idea was taken straight out of Facebook. I thought people would benefit from seeing what it would look like in action. As developers it's easy for us to imagine it, but even we need to mock things up to get a look at it, to help think better about it.
- catshirt 11y agoi think my main point is that the display mechanism must be the least of the concerns with respect to introducing > 140 characters. that is to say- I don't believe anyone thinks it's an aesthetic impossibility. it seems fruitless to dictate "how" without being part of the "why and why not" discussions.
- josu 11y agoIf he had been appointed CEO of a fortune cookie factory would he have made the announcement through fortune cookies? What about a tattoo parlor?
- mcphilip 11y agoPulling up that link in Safari on mobile really demonstrates how bad the UI/UX is. There is no obvious way to see anything other than the first tweet in the series: http://m.imgur.com/7JSETBc http://m.imgur.com/7JSETBc
- 100k 11y agoHa. Thanks for the note. I'm reading on Mobile Safari, so without it, I would have thought Dorsey's message was just a single, ambiguous tweet.
- monochromatic 11y agohttps://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10305855 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10305855
- jordanmessina 11y agoFrom the ReCode article: "Twitter and Square both declined to comment." Now it's official
- bru_ 11y agoPeople are worried that Jack will be too busy between Twitter and Square, but what they don't know is that the dude's been completely spaced out for the last 4 years, making the same motivational presentation about his Dad's pizza shop to anyone that will listen. Nobody at Twitter talks to Jack anymore, even the most Senior people.
- CrackpotGonzo 11y agoAm I missing a joke here? (honest question)
- demian 11y agoHe seems to be there mostly for PR and customer relations.
- austenallred 11y agoTo the people whose only contact with a company are via PR and customer relations, of course it seems like that's all he does. That's the only side you see. Does anyone making comments like this have any idea what happens internally? The employees I know at Twitter are thrilled.
- codingdave 11y agoPeople with a vested interest in twitter seem to be thrilled. And they are the ones defending twitter in this discussion. Neutral outsiders are much more apprehensive. Take that how you will... could be that they know more than us, as you imply. Could be bias. Time will tell.
- demian 11y agoRight, he fits a role in the company's narrative, both for the inside and outside. He is perceived as twitter "creator/inventor" after all, so I can understand why the employees are thrilled.
- Vecrios 11y agoChris Sacca would sleep very soundly tonight. Jokes aside, I think Jack is the man for the job. He has proven capable in square. I hope he does the same with Twitter. The company needs to take advantages of the huge market share it has.
- jgalt212 11y agoI disagree. He's proven capable as a fundraiser at Square. Square is far from a success, thus far. That being said, I'm not sure anyone could have made Square a success from the P&L perspective--the payments space is just damn crowded.
- fitzwatermellow 11y agoCongrats, @jack Would love to see twtr become a platform for a myriad of third-party apps. Wouldn't it be great to place a market order by messaging @bats "buy $TWTR 10,000 30.00". Or order a limo with @uber "2 people in one hour to jfk airport"?
- CPLX 11y ago> Or order a limo with @uber "2 people in one hour to jfk airport"? Why would typing out a generic request to a several square mile area without any identifying information be better than a GPS enabled app with real time communications, mapping, and integrated payment? I see this kind of comment all the time (eg that ridiculous "magic" SMS startup) and always wonder how otherwise rational, linear thinkers develop this delusion.
- jkestner 11y agoAnd it depends on what's at hand. If your phone is basically a Twitter machine, maybe. This will be more easily accomplished by talking to Siri or Google Now.
- Karunamon 11y agoYou describe a tech problem, and not a really intractable one. It already has "real time communications (as, yknow, the main purpose of the service)", it can already do GPS coords, and expect payment integration soon. I'd love to see Twitter become a "command line of the web". Add voice integration on top of it via siri/google/etc, and it come become the plaintext glue between a lot of services. What we have here is a pub/sub message transmission layer that just happens to be used by a lot of people for personal communication. Having machines use that for other things is something that's already been experimented with - using it as a de-facto API layer is a logical step.
- CPLX 11y agoBut this is nonsensical. As far as I can see there are two parties to this hypothetical transaction, me the smartphone owner, and Uber the company. I open the Uber app and use it. Why do I want to insert Twitter in the middle of this transaction? What problem is it that you're trying to solve?
- codingdave 11y agoTwitter does not need to gain new users - it needs to reactivate old users. The statistic I cannot get past is that they have lost one billion users. That is a much different problem than most companies are dealing with.
- taytus 11y agoI honestly wonder how many of twitter's accounts are fake accounts, it seems that spam is a huge problem there.
- uptown 11y agoNo idea. But I'd throw $100 their way to buy an account that's been dormant for six years.
- slayed0 11y agowhy?
- softawre 11y agoImagine you have to write an algorithm to determine twitter spam. Would it include accountCreatedDate?
- minimaxir 11y agoThe algorithm would probably contain a dummy variable representing isYoungerThanXDays where X is the median number of time it takes to create a new account after it has been banned. I doubt accounts that are Y days old vs. Z years old have different probabilities of being spammers.
- dangrossman 11y agoDormant accounts can hold good handles forever. Like the name of my website: https://twitter.com/improvely https://twitter.com/improvely
- ar7hur 11y agoI still think it's impossible to run two companies that both require so much attention, given their stage. Yes Jobs had Apple and Pixar, and Musk has Tesla and SpaceX. But both Pixar and SpaceX don't really require day-to-day CEO attention, they follow long term plans (movies, rockets). That's really different from Square and Twitter, which are both, in their own ways, in a kind of trouble. I'd love to be proven wrong though -- so good luck, Jack!
- kmfrk 11y agoIPOs didn't require the roadshow they do nowadays either, which will keep Jack well occupied, when Square goes public.
- presty 11y agoagain with this? jobs was never ceo of pixar...
- hellofunk 11y agoHm, Pixar wiki says this: Steve Jobs (February 24, 1955 - October 5, 2011) was one of the three founding fathers of Pixar Animation Studios. A business magnate and inventor, he was the former CEO of Apple Inc. and Pixar Animation Studios.
- ksherlock 11y agoFrom a 1997 Pixar SEC filing: "Mr. Jobs is a co-founder of Pixar and has served as its Chairman since March 1991, as its Chief Executive Officer since February 1986 and in the Office of the President since February 1995. He has been a director of Pixar since February 1986 and served as Chairman from February 1986 to November 1988."
- icebraining 11y agoI don't think that Wiki is official; that said, the NYTimes, CNN, Forbes and others all claim he was CEO of Pixar.
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- uptown 11y ago"Twitter Feels Compelled to Point Out That Twitter CEO Is a Full-Time Job" https://recode.net/2015/06/22/twitter-feels-compelled-to-point-out-that-twitter-ceo-is-a-full-time-job/ https://recode.net/2015/06/22/twitter-feels-compelled-to-poi...
- mikeryan 11y agoI'm not a huge fan of the CEO of two companies thing, but Jack has been interim CEO for 3 months. At least if they changed their position on this they've got the evidence that he can handle both roles.
- deleted 11y ago[deleted]
- jackgavigan 11y agoI can't see this working out. Dorsey probably is the best candidate for CEO of Twitter, and I think there are some very low-hanging fruit to pick when it comes to solving Twitter's product issues (I disagree with Startup L Jackson - Twitter's product is not fucking fine). The market reaction has been positive - TWTR opened up 3.15% just now. However, Square is a different story altogether. Square Wallet was a damp squib, and Square's facing competition both from established players like Intuit and more recent entrants to the market, like iZettle. Leading Square and bringing it to market seems like a full-time job to me, and I wouldn't be surprised if it's IPO valuation takes a hit because it lacks a full-time CEO.
- ryandetzel 11y agoI have friends at Square and they seem to think it's great. From what they've said the last few months have been better for them as well with Jack as interim CEO of Twitter. Maybe he needs this to be really driven? Time will tell but I think you're right, it won't hurt Twitter as much as it might hurt Square.
- jackgavigan 11y ago> From what they've said the last few months have been better for them as well with Jack as interim CEO of Twitter. That reads like they think it's good that he's not spending as much time focusing on Square! :-)
- sulam 11y agoTWTR the stock was down when the news leaked last week, and has gradually regained that ground. In general, though, I've lost 30% of the value of my Twitter stock since Jack's first earnings call. It will take a lot of up days to recover those losses.
- NH_2 11y agoI think this will be good for Twitter. Jack will be able to make big identity and design decisions over the next few years with less pushback from the employees and users than any non-founder CEO. He's already begun by declaring that tweets will extend beyond 140 chars, and the response has been apprehension instead of outright rejection. And for Twitter to remain competitive with Facebook, even as Facebook builds Notes and live-streaming video to cater journalists, Twitter is going to need to make many of these decisions.
- kylebgorman 11y agoI'm short Twitter. The fact of the matter is it that Twitter should never have become a multibillion-dollar company. There is no barrier to entry into this space---any competent web developer could make a non-scaling Twitter in an afternoon---except network effects, and those have proved weak due to poor user experience, particularly for new users. Twitter should have treated itself like a utility, and focused less on the online advertising race-to-the-bottom that it is sure to lose due to the aforementioned poor user experience and negative sentiment about the platform's future; this announcement is only going to continue to contribute to poor impressions. The other monetization directions they have played around with---namely selling access to researchers and advertisers, and certifying identities of accounts for celebrities and brands---are a much better fit for the platform, and would have sustained a fast-moving company of 50 hotshot engineers. But the constant pressure to get bigger and bigger has served Twitter poorly. I'm sad to say that I think it will be a ghost town in a few years.
- paulpauper 11y agoYou got to have balls of steel to short a company like Twitter. I would rather short oil, gas, or commodity companies . Facebook stock, for example, is up 200% since 2012, leaving a lot of shorts burned in the process who thought it was overvalued.
- joncooper 11y agoAre you a professional investor?
- davidcgl 11y ago> any competent web developer could make A non-scaling Twitter in an afternoon I wish people would stop claiming how they could clone a social media app in an afternoon / weekend.
- talmand 11y agoWhat do you mean? I fully believe that a competent developer could sit down and make something like Twitter in a weekend. Especially since the concept and what to do with it is already on display for them to copy. Now, to create a Twitter clone in a weekend when there's no Twitter to go by? Nope.
- rch 11y agoWho had the most significant role in getting Twitter results prominent placement in Google desktop results? That seems like a mutually beneficial development.
- seiji 11y agoGoogle used to have twitter results a long time ago. Then Google got a little pissy and decided they wanted to be The Only Social On The Internet and killed Twitter priority indexing (e.g. receiving the firehose). It was probably the most ineffectual attempted flexing of monopoly power in the history of monopoly abuse. Now that Google realized they can't be good at everything (really, are they good at much besides a few focused things?), they're open to integration and collaboration on their not-so-competitive-advantages again.
- rch 11y agoNoted, but I thought there was some posturing on Twitter's side regarding terms and pricing for firehose access as well.
- samfisher83 11y agoI think using twitter as a platform for ordering things etc. would be something he could do to make money. They should open it up to developers and charge them for cool apps.
- tscosj 11y agoImagine, you are famous man! Orders are bad idea, here's why: to send for 1m subscribers that you are going to sell your pants from 1998 tour sounds interesting, but you do have just one pair of pant to sell.
- ilamont 11y ago“It’s exhilarating for him,” one long-time confidante said. “He draws energy from how to think about both companies.” Whether by coincidence or design, Dorsey’s comeback closely resembles the Steve Jobs Narrative — a modern myth Silicon Valley entrepreneurs hold up as a map to absolution. (1) I'm going with "by design." His ego risks the futures of both companies, unfortunately. Surprised the Twitter board caved on allowing a part-time CEO. 1. http://recode.net/2015/10/02/why-jack-dorsey-is-ready-to-save-twitter/ http://recode.net/2015/10/02/why-jack-dorsey-is-ready-to-sav...
- antiffan 11y agoSlightly off-topic, but I recently interviewed at Square, and I also have some long-time contacts there. I can honestly say they have some of the most brilliant engineering minds I have encountered working there. Whether it's a trickle-down effect from Dorsey or otherwise, they have succeeded in recruiting and retaining many extremely talented individuals. I am curious if anyone has recent anecdotes in regards to the engineering talent at Twitter (aside from the talent that came in with Periscope).
- sulam 11y agoThe quality of the Twitter engineering team is very high. This is why people are poaching them hard right now.
- kbenson 11y agoI first read this as "Twitter names Jack Donaghy Chief Executive" and thought I was in for a good laugh. Now I'm disappointed. :/ Edit: To be clear, I thought Twitter was just expressing a good sense of humor, and I was disappointed in that I was expecting something humorous but didn't find that.
- deleted 11y ago[deleted]
- sjg007 11y agoStay tuned for twitter square integration. Buy with twitter should go through square.
- yuhong 11y agoFrom https://twitter.com/SJosephBurns/status/640698530038943748 https://twitter.com/SJosephBurns/status/640698530038943748: "Twitter needs a CEO who is an @elonmusk with the Street and a @pmarca in the tweets. - @zerobeta"
- inthewoods 11y agoI keep wondering if this is going to be like Marissa Mayer joining Yahoo - much fanfare, some movement, but at the end of the day she's been unable to significantly move the needle. I just wonder if Twitter fundamentally isn't as scalable an idea/product as Facebook et al. It's obviously Jack's job to make it that - but what if the basic form of Twitter just isn't as compelling, no matter how you change it or dress it up?
- killwhitey 11y agoThen his job is find something else for Twitter to make. Facebook has launched a lot of experimental apps like Paper, Rooms, Slingshot, Messenger. And they bought Instagram which is very successful. Under Costolo Twitter bought vine and periscope, but they haven't tried to experiment with new app ideas internally.
- ethanbond 11y agoIn what world is Paper, Rooms, or Slingshot even remotely successful? And obviously the messaging service attached to an already massive social network would be compelling, that's not really an "experimental app" by any definition.
- giarc 11y agoI don't think the commenter implied, or meant to imply they were successful.
- ethanbond 11y agoAh, my loose reading. I read it as "he must find something Twitter can be successful with, as Facebook... etc" I see now that I was wrong there!
- rufb 11y agoIn that case, we'll give you: News Feed, Pages, Groups, Messenger, Events, the Platform, and Connect, which have all been pivotal to Facebook's success (I guess more than one of these has been the first time email was dethroned as unquestionable medium for doing some thing or another).
- curiousjorge 11y agoWhat if you created a website that no matter how hard you try, you can never make enough money to justify it's insane valuation? You hire the guy that created it. If that fails years down the road, hire a blonde.
- tscosj 11y agoSometimes the blonde is the only choice to make a decision, because "try hard" isn't universal truth for every single mediums. Chaikovsky is a great musician/composer/genius, but people prefer M. Cyrus obviously!
- supergirl 11y agowhen twitter finally pops everybody will see the bubble. or maybe uber pops first
- harrygold 11y agoTwitter has incredible value as a tool to break realtime news and events. The problem is, it buried in a veneer of fruitless and redundant tweets that nobody wants to dig through. If they can figure out how to surface the value 'there's gold in them hills!'
- vit05 11y agoI hope Jack realizes that Twitter is not a great tool to chat with friends / neighborhood / family, but an incredible tool to reach people who are away from you, social and geographical. They need to focus on how easy it is to approach a movie star, your favorite player and musician you like. How easy it is to show that you like a brand or you love a new TV show. And talk about some major events that are happening around you. For people who have no idea what it is, they just see it as a tool to talk to someone. And most of the time, you do not have any feedback on what you wrote. In fact, you may not have any idea how many people have read what you have written. So I think if they focused on showing how Twitter is great for expanding the boundaries of what you want to talk and make easy to see feedback from people about what you have spoken, they can attract more people.
- piratebroadcast 11y agoTwitter should buy Slack and own the workplace communications market.
- tscosj 11y agoWhat I don't understand is "to scale" part of an article. If you cannot sell shit to 225M people, how you gonna sell that for 1B?