I'd modify that a little, basically riffing on Marco Arment's proposal[1]: developers will do great things for a platform if we use it, if it's in popular use,

I'd modify that a little, basically riffing on Marco Arment's proposal[1]: developers will do great things for a platform if we use it, if it's in popular use, and if there's money to be made. Twitter the service, I would say, has been fluttering between one and three of those things - the problem is that Twitter the company has been trying to choke out the "money to be made" criteria, and that, as you observe, drives developers away. [1]: http://www.marco.org/2010/11/04/developers-dont-rush-to-new-platforms http://www.marco.org/2010/11/04/developers-dont-rush-to-new-...