> The issue here is that it is being spoken of as a protocol, which isn't just some kind of analogy. It is a word with a literal definition. Every word has a l

> The issue here is that it is being spoken of as a protocol, which isn't just some kind of analogy. It is a word with a literal definition. Every word has a literal definition, but every word also has an infinite variety of meaning, with nuance and subtlety that depends on context. It is quite obvious that Paul Graham didn't mean that Twitter was literally "another HTTP". I take the meaning to be something like "Twitter is an open platform that is widely-used enough to enable communication between other services" — not the case now, of course, but it certainly was at the time.