4 ms·
No one is asking my opinion, but here it is: Trifurcate Twitter into three distinct parts: * The social--what users actually use it for. * The ad platform. *
by firebones 10y ago
No one is asking my opinion, but here it is:
Trifurcate Twitter into three distinct parts:
* The social--what users actually use it for.
* The ad platform.
* The realtime gestalt/search platform.
The latter is what is inadequately funded and considered.
Twitter has a latency advantage on the pulse of thought across the user base. The user base is already high-value for this relative to the morass of Facebook users. This is the key differentiator. This is what you base the platform and the value of search upon. You don't bury it by restricting the API, or trying to shift it into the realm of the social platform with "Moments"--you build dependency upon it, and monetize that unique value by those who need to keep the pulse. This creates value for the other two parts. It is also woefully underfunded.
Someone mentioned an AWS-like model. That is thinking along the right track. Make the gestalt a utility that people will pay for.
Yes, you still have all the spam/hate issues on the social platform, and those need to be solved. But those only become a corporate imperative if Twitter is resigned to merely being a social network rather than a platform.
Maybe it's actually 4 parts--I forgot about the live event deals (e.g., NFL games). There's a raw, traditional media part, but I'd align that with the advertising part.
- nyxtom 10y agoDidn't they buy out Gnip precisely for this reason?
- hnthroooow 10y agoI have no way to verify this is true, but I was told that they bought GNIP because (this sounds too ridiculous to type) they forgot to invoice them for two years for firehose access...when they remembered, GNIP couldn't afford the invoice, so buyout! Like I say, it's a rumor that may have shades of truth, but that's what I heard.
- pmorelli 10y agoAs someone who worked on that acquisition, that rumor is total horseshit.
- idm 10y agoI love apocryphal tales like this. There's a kernel of logic to the original assertion. It has a "gee whiz" irony, coded as a moral story: the biggest brains in the world forgot to get paid. Twitter's perceived revenue problems are juxtaposed with the obviousness of just taking the money they were owed, as if the answer to Twitter's Big Question were there the whole time. Finally, it explains a really major acquisition in Twitter history; it answers an outstanding question in everybody's minds. That little vignette has all the fixings for a great Silicon Valley tall tale. The fact that it's totally false, by public refutation, seals the deal. I love it!