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It seems crazy that people bemoan the fact that twitter only does 4.8 bill or whatever the current run rate is. Since when is that awful? It's only awful when y

It seems crazy that people bemoan the fact that twitter only does 4.8 bill or whatever the current run rate is. Since when is that awful? It's only awful when you compare it to Facebook and a few others. Compared to almost all businesses ever, it has grown to be a giant in an amazingly short period of time and is doing well on every dimension, including financial. It's popular, engaging and has a solid business model. Again, only when you compare it to some of the most freakish outliers in the history of business does it look less than amazing.

cbozeman 5y ago
Well you've just outlined the problem. Twitter's Board of Directors is a listing of people who've come to expect the projects with which they're involved - either directly or tangentially - or with which they invest, to perform in such a ridiculously obscene manner that even exceptional growth and profits appears to be "underperforming". For many of these people, there's no problem - where "problem" is defined as 'not being a 1000x bagger stock 5 - 10 years from IPO launch' - that cannot be solved through some alchemical combination of AI/ML, automation, aggressive user engagement, monetization, etc. Compared to Amazon, Facebook, Google, Netflix, etc., Twitter is an also-ran. Which is absolutely, utterly, unabashedly insane to think.
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
- skinnymuch 5y ago
  I just did a super take with a sibling comment to yours comparing Twitter to other social media and comm products. > Twitter is an also-ran. Which is absolutely, utterly, unabashedly insane to think. Yes, this is absolutely crazy! The other problem is how much Twitter is brought up by people and the media. Data shows a minority of the already minority of people who use Twitter, talk politics. Yet you can’t go any time without people pointing to Twitter as a representation of a huge population to prove their points. For example, reactions to “cancelling” someone will have droves of people and media point to a tiny portion of Twitter saying things that can’t represent the massive demographic people are critiquing. All of this makes Twitter seem so much more important even to people not constantly around tech, startup, or SV circles.
  - B1FF_PSUVM 5y ago
    > seem so much more important Comes to mind the scene in Heinlein's Glory Road where the hero stuffs the hostile giant's foot in the giant's own mouth, and pushes hard. Keeps pushing etc, until there's only a ball of wax to dispose of. (Sidekick's comment: "Didn't know you were good at advanced math.")
    - skinnymuch 5y ago
      Hahaha
  - esyir 5y ago
    >All of this makes Twitter seem so much more important even to people not constantly around tech, startup, or SV circles. I hate saying this, but Twitter does have outsized importance even to people not in said circles. That's because there's a concentration of influence on Twitter. Politicians, celebrities and especially journalists are on twitter. That means that the Twitter bubble can both diverge from the general population, then have an disproportionate impact on them.
- nicce 5y ago
  I wish that one day, there is a non-profit organization which provides social media and almost everyone uses it. Direct ads are forbidden. There are set of some high level rules and any country can be part of moderation as long they follow these same rules. Maybe money could come selling from some anonymized data. Even partially government funded. Infrastructure should be decentralized. Maybe you can pay 1€ per month to get more some features. It takes only tiny fraction what these current companies are making money, to maintain such environment. Forbidden dystopia...
  - riffic 5y ago
    anyone can run their own social media services, today. this stuff has existed since 2008 or so (https://www.w3.org/2008/09/msnws/papers/W3C_FOSN_Position_Paper https://www.w3.org/2008/09/msnws/papers/W3C_FOSN_Position_Pa...). With today's interoperable protocols you don't need a non-profit provider organization to give this to you. this forum is so oblivious sometimes.
    - nicce 5y ago
      Of course, but the point being that nonprofit or not-for-profit has no financial motivation which could lead for abusive behavior. And somehow a lot of users are required to platform being meaninful.
skinnymuch 5y ago
I combined two draft blog posts and wrote an intro to give some context to why people may see Twitter as not having lived up enough. It’s going to be very long. Heh. No worries if it isn’t read: ——— Many growth/tech stocks are off by 10-40% from higher peaks or averages since the market went bananas in April & May 2020. Almost all growth/tech stocks are off by over 10% from late Oct or mid Nov. Twitter as you stated with its run rate, will top $5B rev in 2021. The stock price opened at $45.5, $36.5B market cap. Twitter is off ~30% from most of 2021. Which is $65/share and a $52B market cap. *Comparisons*: - Pinterest market cap is ~25% less. Not well monetized so far. ~$2.5B rev in 2021. - Snap's market cap is more than double. Rev could hit $4B for 2021. So ~22% less. - LinkedIn was acquired by Microsoft in 2016. Announced in June, completed December 2016. It was trading at a $17.5B market cap before acquisition. Rev for 2016 was $3.7B. This year the run rate has topped $10B. 2021 rev will top $11.5B. - For context, Twitter was worth $13B in June 2016 with $2.5B rev for 2016. - Github was bought for $7.5B in stock. Announced and completed in June and Oct 2018. Microsoft shares were $99 in June 2018. They opened at $335 today. Those $7.5B acquisition shares are worth $25.5B today. - Gitlab, a partial competitor to Github, closed its 1st public day on Oct 14, 2021 above $15B. It's valued above $14B today. Annual run rate above $200M. - Gitlab has no overlap with Twitter. GitHub does with its social network and other trends. GitHub's valuation, whether under Microsoft now, or as a hypothetical public company, is likely 3x+ Gitlab. Or ~$45B. Github 2018 rev was likely above $300M. These numbers won't line up with Twitter because of both getting a lot of SaaS, subscription, and enterprise revenue. - Telegram allegedly has been bank rolled by its founder since inception. I personally doubt this, but regardless, its bank roll has been limited. It didn't get the vast capital or marketing/namespace an SV company gets. Telegram's burn rate is lower than Twitter or any other company listed. Rumors say Telegram has turned down funding at a $30B valuation. Other rumors speak to a $30-50B IPO in 2023. - LINE, a messaging app with some social network features, is based in and most popular in Japan. It was a subsidiary of Korean company, Naver. LINE went public a few years ago. It did a 50/50 merger with Softbank's Yahoo Japan. The combined company, Z Holdings, has a market cap of $45B. LINE is most popular in a couple of South East Asian countries and with expats. - KakaoTalk, a messaging app with some social network features, is based in and most popular in Korea. It is much smaller than the others. 50M active users in 2021 with 90% in South Korea. KakaoTalk's parent company, Kakao, merged with Naver's competitor Daum with the current company called Kakao and valued at $45B. KakaoTalk only represents a fraction of this value.

cbozeman 5y ago

Well you've just outlined the problem. Twitter's Board of Directors is a listing of people who've come to expect the projects with which they're involved - either directly or tangentially - or with which they invest, to perform in such a ridiculously obscene manner that even exceptional growth and profits appears to be "underperforming". For many of these people, there's no problem - where "problem" is defined as 'not being a 1000x bagger stock 5 - 10 years from IPO launch' - that cannot be solved through some alchemical combination of AI/ML, automation, aggressive user engagement, monetization, etc. Compared to Amazon, Facebook, Google, Netflix, etc., Twitter is an also-ran. Which is absolutely, utterly, unabashedly insane to think.

deleted 5y ago
[deleted]
skinnymuch 5y ago
I just did a super take with a sibling comment to yours comparing Twitter to other social media and comm products. > Twitter is an also-ran. Which is absolutely, utterly, unabashedly insane to think. Yes, this is absolutely crazy! The other problem is how much Twitter is brought up by people and the media. Data shows a minority of the already minority of people who use Twitter, talk politics. Yet you can’t go any time without people pointing to Twitter as a representation of a huge population to prove their points. For example, reactions to “cancelling” someone will have droves of people and media point to a tiny portion of Twitter saying things that can’t represent the massive demographic people are critiquing. All of this makes Twitter seem so much more important even to people not constantly around tech, startup, or SV circles.
- B1FF_PSUVM 5y ago
  > seem so much more important Comes to mind the scene in Heinlein's Glory Road where the hero stuffs the hostile giant's foot in the giant's own mouth, and pushes hard. Keeps pushing etc, until there's only a ball of wax to dispose of. (Sidekick's comment: "Didn't know you were good at advanced math.")
  - skinnymuch 5y ago
    Hahaha
- esyir 5y ago
  >All of this makes Twitter seem so much more important even to people not constantly around tech, startup, or SV circles. I hate saying this, but Twitter does have outsized importance even to people not in said circles. That's because there's a concentration of influence on Twitter. Politicians, celebrities and especially journalists are on twitter. That means that the Twitter bubble can both diverge from the general population, then have an disproportionate impact on them.
nicce 5y ago
I wish that one day, there is a non-profit organization which provides social media and almost everyone uses it. Direct ads are forbidden. There are set of some high level rules and any country can be part of moderation as long they follow these same rules. Maybe money could come selling from some anonymized data. Even partially government funded. Infrastructure should be decentralized. Maybe you can pay 1€ per month to get more some features. It takes only tiny fraction what these current companies are making money, to maintain such environment. Forbidden dystopia...
- riffic 5y ago
  anyone can run their own social media services, today. this stuff has existed since 2008 or so (https://www.w3.org/2008/09/msnws/papers/W3C_FOSN_Position_Paper https://www.w3.org/2008/09/msnws/papers/W3C_FOSN_Position_Pa...). With today's interoperable protocols you don't need a non-profit provider organization to give this to you. this forum is so oblivious sometimes.
  - nicce 5y ago
    Of course, but the point being that nonprofit or not-for-profit has no financial motivation which could lead for abusive behavior. And somehow a lot of users are required to platform being meaninful.

skinnymuch 5y ago

I combined two draft blog posts and wrote an intro to give some context to why people may see Twitter as not having lived up enough. It’s going to be very long. Heh. No worries if it isn’t read: ——— Many growth/tech stocks are off by 10-40% from higher peaks or averages since the market went bananas in April & May 2020. Almost all growth/tech stocks are off by over 10% from late Oct or mid Nov. Twitter as you stated with its run rate, will top $5B rev in 2021. The stock price opened at $45.5, $36.5B market cap. Twitter is off ~30% from most of 2021. Which is $65/share and a $52B market cap. *Comparisons*: - Pinterest market cap is ~25% less. Not well monetized so far. ~$2.5B rev in 2021. - Snap's market cap is more than double. Rev could hit $4B for 2021. So ~22% less. - LinkedIn was acquired by Microsoft in 2016. Announced in June, completed December 2016. It was trading at a $17.5B market cap before acquisition. Rev for 2016 was $3.7B. This year the run rate has topped $10B. 2021 rev will top $11.5B. - For context, Twitter was worth $13B in June 2016 with $2.5B rev for 2016. - Github was bought for $7.5B in stock. Announced and completed in June and Oct 2018. Microsoft shares were $99 in June 2018. They opened at $335 today. Those $7.5B acquisition shares are worth $25.5B today. - Gitlab, a partial competitor to Github, closed its 1st public day on Oct 14, 2021 above $15B. It's valued above $14B today. Annual run rate above $200M. - Gitlab has no overlap with Twitter. GitHub does with its social network and other trends. GitHub's valuation, whether under Microsoft now, or as a hypothetical public company, is likely 3x+ Gitlab. Or ~$45B. Github 2018 rev was likely above $300M. These numbers won't line up with Twitter because of both getting a lot of SaaS, subscription, and enterprise revenue. - Telegram allegedly has been bank rolled by its founder since inception. I personally doubt this, but regardless, its bank roll has been limited. It didn't get the vast capital or marketing/namespace an SV company gets. Telegram's burn rate is lower than Twitter or any other company listed. Rumors say Telegram has turned down funding at a $30B valuation. Other rumors speak to a $30-50B IPO in 2023. - LINE, a messaging app with some social network features, is based in and most popular in Japan. It was a subsidiary of Korean company, Naver. LINE went public a few years ago. It did a 50/50 merger with Softbank's Yahoo Japan. The combined company, Z Holdings, has a market cap of $45B. LINE is most popular in a couple of South East Asian countries and with expats. - KakaoTalk, a messaging app with some social network features, is based in and most popular in Korea. It is much smaller than the others. 50M active users in 2021 with 90% in South Korea. KakaoTalk's parent company, Kakao, merged with Naver's competitor Daum with the current company called Kakao and valued at $45B. KakaoTalk only represents a fraction of this value.