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I 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 significa

I 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 ago
Then 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 ago
  In 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 ago
    I don't think the commenter implied, or meant to imply they were successful.
    - ethanbond 11y ago
      Ah, 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 ago
    In 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).
- SandB0x 11y ago
  Don't forget WhatsApp!
- hockley 11y ago
  If they went back to their roots as a messaging API for other apps, they would not have to build new apps. Become the messaging backbone for the Internet. That's plenty of scale to go after.
  - nailer 11y ago
    Pretty sure that's the basis of removing the 140 char limit for DMs. Some people are way more likely to use Twitter than an 'SMS' type messenger that wants phone numbers that they don't know.
    - hkmurakami 11y ago
      Precisely the reason why LINE is so popular in Asia particularly between people who just met.
  - deleted 11y ago
    [deleted]
  - untog 11y ago
    > Become the messaging backbone for the Internet. That's plenty of scale to go after. Where's the money in that, though?
    - sjg007 11y ago
      In the data. Advertising, etc..
  - scrollaway 11y ago
    I hope they don't. The last thing we need is a proprietary solution for "the messaging backbone for the internet". =/
meatysnapper 11y ago
Almost certainly. Twitter's user base is not growing, and their product basically hasn't changed in 5 years. They have a valuable brand, but they need to figure out how to fundamentally improve the ease of use of the whole thing and make a decent value proposition. Photos, messages, videos, search... make the app not suck. Snapchat and Instagram are very quickly taking over the celebrity/new/sports one-to-many angle from Twitter. Once celebrities depart, Twitter will have only news, and that's not enough most likely.
- tajano 11y ago
  > they need to figure out how to fundamentally improve the ease of use of the whole thing I've frequently heard this theory, that Twitter's problem is that it's too complicated. I don't buy it. It has a simpler UI than Facebook or Snapchat, and it's not significantly more complicated than Instagram or Vine or Periscope or any other media sharing platform. If you personally enjoy Twitter and derive value from it, it's easy to believe that people who don't get into Twitter just don't understand it it. My experience is that many people sign up, send their first tweet, and then say, "OK, I get it, and I have no use for this." I've helped my friends follow news sources and celebrities they like, but then they look at the wall of Tweets and say, "OK, I get it, but I don't want to read things in this format." It's not about ease-of-use for them, it's about the basic value proposition of tweeting and the Twitter feed.
  - shampine 11y ago
    I think that was more common to hear as people didn't seem to understand @messages and #hashtags. So when they saw: > .@jack #awesome They didn't know what that meant. Now that hashtags and @ style messaging are just about everywhere, I don't think it is a valid theory.
    - dnr 11y ago
      As a non-twitter-using software engineer, when I land on a twitter page, I still find it fairly intimidating and requiring special knowledge. For example, why is there a dot before the @ in your example? (I actually know the answer to that because I looked it up once, but it's totally not obvious.) What's with all the slashes in numbered lists? Because of the character limit, people use a lot of abbreviations and shorthand that I can usually figure out with some puzzling, but I shouldn't have to do that. I still see url-shortener urls all over on twitter, when I should just see regular urls. These may be minor points, but it adds up to giving off the feeling that there's an in-crowd and I'm not invited. It is much better than it was a few years ago, though, so maybe it'll get there. (I'm not even getting into the difficulty of actually following a conversation on twitter! Reverse-chronological order plus the lack of linking replies to their parent messages make it nearly impossible, but that's a well-known issue.)
abalone 11y ago
Realtime news and straight-from-the-horse's mouth access to celebrities is fundamentally a good opportunity that no one does better than Twitter right now. The question is whether they'll have the decisiveness to make it a better experience for a broader audience without alienating the core that generates the best content.
- jay_kyburz 11y ago
  I think this is key. On Media Watch (Australia) last week they discussed how savvy politicians now use social to speak directly to the public, cutting the middle man out of the equation. The middle man being traditional news media. I think facebook is less appropriate for this kind of celebrity broadcast. I find it frustrating to watch twitter flail around because I can see this epic opportunity hanging right in front of them. I really hope they can take that small step and make twitter something truly epic.

killwhitey 11y ago

Then 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 ago
In 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 ago
  I don't think the commenter implied, or meant to imply they were successful.
  - ethanbond 11y ago
    Ah, 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 ago
  In 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).
SandB0x 11y ago
Don't forget WhatsApp!
hockley 11y ago
If they went back to their roots as a messaging API for other apps, they would not have to build new apps. Become the messaging backbone for the Internet. That's plenty of scale to go after.
- nailer 11y ago
  Pretty sure that's the basis of removing the 140 char limit for DMs. Some people are way more likely to use Twitter than an 'SMS' type messenger that wants phone numbers that they don't know.
  - hkmurakami 11y ago
    Precisely the reason why LINE is so popular in Asia particularly between people who just met.
- deleted 11y ago
  [deleted]
- untog 11y ago
  > Become the messaging backbone for the Internet. That's plenty of scale to go after. Where's the money in that, though?
  - sjg007 11y ago
    In the data. Advertising, etc..
- scrollaway 11y ago
  I hope they don't. The last thing we need is a proprietary solution for "the messaging backbone for the internet". =/

meatysnapper 11y ago

Almost certainly. Twitter's user base is not growing, and their product basically hasn't changed in 5 years. They have a valuable brand, but they need to figure out how to fundamentally improve the ease of use of the whole thing and make a decent value proposition. Photos, messages, videos, search... make the app not suck. Snapchat and Instagram are very quickly taking over the celebrity/new/sports one-to-many angle from Twitter. Once celebrities depart, Twitter will have only news, and that's not enough most likely.

tajano 11y ago
> they need to figure out how to fundamentally improve the ease of use of the whole thing I've frequently heard this theory, that Twitter's problem is that it's too complicated. I don't buy it. It has a simpler UI than Facebook or Snapchat, and it's not significantly more complicated than Instagram or Vine or Periscope or any other media sharing platform. If you personally enjoy Twitter and derive value from it, it's easy to believe that people who don't get into Twitter just don't understand it it. My experience is that many people sign up, send their first tweet, and then say, "OK, I get it, and I have no use for this." I've helped my friends follow news sources and celebrities they like, but then they look at the wall of Tweets and say, "OK, I get it, but I don't want to read things in this format." It's not about ease-of-use for them, it's about the basic value proposition of tweeting and the Twitter feed.
- shampine 11y ago
  I think that was more common to hear as people didn't seem to understand @messages and #hashtags. So when they saw: > .@jack #awesome They didn't know what that meant. Now that hashtags and @ style messaging are just about everywhere, I don't think it is a valid theory.
  - dnr 11y ago
    As a non-twitter-using software engineer, when I land on a twitter page, I still find it fairly intimidating and requiring special knowledge. For example, why is there a dot before the @ in your example? (I actually know the answer to that because I looked it up once, but it's totally not obvious.) What's with all the slashes in numbered lists? Because of the character limit, people use a lot of abbreviations and shorthand that I can usually figure out with some puzzling, but I shouldn't have to do that. I still see url-shortener urls all over on twitter, when I should just see regular urls. These may be minor points, but it adds up to giving off the feeling that there's an in-crowd and I'm not invited. It is much better than it was a few years ago, though, so maybe it'll get there. (I'm not even getting into the difficulty of actually following a conversation on twitter! Reverse-chronological order plus the lack of linking replies to their parent messages make it nearly impossible, but that's a well-known issue.)

abalone 11y ago

Realtime news and straight-from-the-horse's mouth access to celebrities is fundamentally a good opportunity that no one does better than Twitter right now. The question is whether they'll have the decisiveness to make it a better experience for a broader audience without alienating the core that generates the best content.

jay_kyburz 11y ago
I think this is key. On Media Watch (Australia) last week they discussed how savvy politicians now use social to speak directly to the public, cutting the middle man out of the equation. The middle man being traditional news media. I think facebook is less appropriate for this kind of celebrity broadcast. I find it frustrating to watch twitter flail around because I can see this epic opportunity hanging right in front of them. I really hope they can take that small step and make twitter something truly epic.