5 ms·

Dear Twitter. I Want To Share My Revenue With You.

39 points by jv2222 17y ago

rokhayakebe 17y ago
How much of a business do you believe can be built around Twitter? This is not to sound sarcastic or not. I made use of the Twitter API back in 2007 to deliver mobile content and RSS to SMS, but those were just features of an application and not a business that relies on Twitter. Do you really believe the Twitter ecosystem is viable for business in the long term?
- zackattack 17y ago
  Millions of dollars are built on the Facebook platform, I fail to see how this is all that different.
  - hyperbovine 17y ago
    Me neither. They'll both be gone in 5 years :)
    - rdrimmie 17y ago
      I wish decrying popular things as fads was just a fad
      - thwarted 17y ago
        If only there wasn't a history of popular things being fads (or of fads being popular) for those who decry to base the decrying position on.
  - rokhayakebe 17y ago
    I would like to know what percentage of Facebook apps can be considered a business?
    - jfarmer 17y ago
      Considering thousands and thousands are made per day and most are not necessarily, probably a very low percentage. A more interesting question, IMO, is the "market size" of Facebook apps, irrespective of your chance of success. I've built a few apps that generate $800k-$1MM in revenue per year. It's just much easier to get massive scale on Facebook than outside on the web, and the monetization methods are constantly improving. Of course, it's hard to say if you can just build a viable ten year business out of it, or if the Platform will be dead in two years. But you take what you can get now, factor in the risk of long-term failure, and branch out it ways that protect you against that. There's certainly enough money to sustain a decent business in a short-to-medium-term.
      - jacquesm 17y ago
        Ok, I believe that without a seconds hesitation. But here is my problem with this: A REAL business, such as twitter or facebook creates an ecosystem around it. You are just part of their ecosystem, conclusion, you are not a business. A business stands on its own strengths, and minimizes its dependence on outside factors that threaten its existence. If your business is solely dependent on Twitter or Facebook you should be trying to diversify like mad.
        caffeine 17y ago
        A REAL business, such as twitter or facebook creates an ecosystem around it :s/REAL/big It's called an ecosystem because of the web of interdependencies. If it makes money, it's a business. Biologists define an organism as a "thing that eats, poops and reproduces." Let's just define a business as "a thing that eats resources and poops profits". In which case, businesses that are "just features" certainly count as businesses. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gut_flora http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gut_flora
        jacquesm 17y ago
        > a thing that eats resources and poops profits By that definition large numbers of web 'businesses' are not businesses (yet) because they do not make profits. Their owners might disagree though. And there are plenty of 'real' businesses out there that make a loss. It's really not that simple to put out a definition of what really is a business, but I think that something that lives by the grace of an API as a total dependent on some other company does not count as a business in its own right. Every now and then you come across a rant somewhere from someone that got 'cut off by google' because they depend for 100% of their sales on search engine traffic, and google happened to provide the bigger portion of that. Suddenly they find out that even though they were profitable last month they did not have an actual business, they forgot to realize they were actually a small extension of the google ecosystem and were only able to make a profit because of that. Anybody that has been in business for a while would realize that is an accident waiting to happen. Making your company 100% dependent on FB or Twitter is no different. It's easy money if and when it works, but easy come, easy go.
jacquesm 17y ago
That makes good sense. It also helps cement a business relationship that would be much more solid than the loose structure in place right now. After all, who will you complain to if one day twitter decides that tweetminer has to die. Better if you have a win/win and it costs them too if they shut you down. These 'third party products' on top of other peoples infrastructure are a recent thing, and I have to admit I'm still getting used to it and not really comfortable with it. A project like that should be called a 'feature', it's not an independent business by any definition, even if it does make money.
- matthewcford 17y ago
  The twitter app I built http://tweetarium.com http://tweetarium.com would benefit from something like this. With regards to twitter pulling the plug on third parities, while it is a worry this could happen, it's risk you factor when building on any platform.
  - jacquesm 17y ago
    If at all possible try to differentiate and make your application work with other ways of exchanging messages (such as IM). That way you're not completely dependent on just the one platform. Ebuddy is a nice sample of a company that did that right, they started out as single platform and now support a whole bunch of them.
drawkbox 17y ago
Considering the value of Twitter was really created by all the third-party apps that use it, it is very possible that a model where third-party developers bring in the revenue isn't so far off from what may happen.
mattmaroon 17y ago
Don't worry, you'll be able to. I imagine what's going to happen with Twitter will be the same thing that will happen with Facebook, just faster. They might even beat Facebook across the finish line. It's a pretty simple plan really: 1. Build a product that gets lots of users. (check) 2. Build a platform on it that is easy and compelling to develop for so third parties can build apps. (check) 3. Let developers figure out how to make money off of those apps. (currently in progress) 4. Create a payment system to make accepting payments from Twitter customers as easy as tweeting, take a cut of the revenue from that.
- sachinag 17y ago
  I think the iPhone and iTMS is the best example of this. If I'm not wrong (and I could be), I thought Zynga was processing payment information on their own servers.
  - avdempsey 17y ago
    Zynga has used several partners for payment processing, but yes, they're not relying on Facebook for this service. Actually, Facebook is making a pile of money off of the Mafia/Farm advertising Zynga does.
    - deleted 17y ago
      [deleted]
  - mattmaroon 17y ago
    They do, but Facebook is already testing out their payment system. The thing is Facebook customers trust Facebook. Having a stored credit system which could then be used for Facebook gifts and purchases in apps would cause more than a 10% uptick in sales for app devs like Zynga, so Facebook could charge a relatively high processing fee like that and still be worth using. They don't even need to mandate exclusivity to do it. They're working on it right now, and I've enough experience with ads to tell you they're never going to make Google money off of their self-serve stuff. Why is too detailed for this, but suffice it to say their actions make me think they feel the same way, but also agree that their platform can make more.
chaosprophet 17y ago
Perhaps building a micropayment service would get Twitter the much talked about revenue??? An option to pay anybody on Twitter by mobile would be great. Kind of like the App Store, you pay by Twitter and the sum + service charges get added to your monthly phone bill.

39 points by jv2222 17y ago

How much of a business do you believe can be built around Twitter? This is not to sound sarcastic or not. I made use of the Twitter API back in 2007 to deliver mobile content and RSS to SMS, but those were just features of an application and not a business that relies on Twitter. Do you really believe the Twitter ecosystem is viable for business in the long term?

zackattack 17y ago
Millions of dollars are built on the Facebook platform, I fail to see how this is all that different.
- hyperbovine 17y ago
  Me neither. They'll both be gone in 5 years :)
  - rdrimmie 17y ago
    I wish decrying popular things as fads was just a fad
    - thwarted 17y ago
      If only there wasn't a history of popular things being fads (or of fads being popular) for those who decry to base the decrying position on.
- rokhayakebe 17y ago
  I would like to know what percentage of Facebook apps can be considered a business?
  - jfarmer 17y ago
    Considering thousands and thousands are made per day and most are not necessarily, probably a very low percentage. A more interesting question, IMO, is the "market size" of Facebook apps, irrespective of your chance of success. I've built a few apps that generate $800k-$1MM in revenue per year. It's just much easier to get massive scale on Facebook than outside on the web, and the monetization methods are constantly improving. Of course, it's hard to say if you can just build a viable ten year business out of it, or if the Platform will be dead in two years. But you take what you can get now, factor in the risk of long-term failure, and branch out it ways that protect you against that. There's certainly enough money to sustain a decent business in a short-to-medium-term.
    - jacquesm 17y ago
      Ok, I believe that without a seconds hesitation. But here is my problem with this: A REAL business, such as twitter or facebook creates an ecosystem around it. You are just part of their ecosystem, conclusion, you are not a business. A business stands on its own strengths, and minimizes its dependence on outside factors that threaten its existence. If your business is solely dependent on Twitter or Facebook you should be trying to diversify like mad.
      - caffeine 17y ago
        A REAL business, such as twitter or facebook creates an ecosystem around it :s/REAL/big It's called an ecosystem because of the web of interdependencies. If it makes money, it's a business. Biologists define an organism as a "thing that eats, poops and reproduces." Let's just define a business as "a thing that eats resources and poops profits". In which case, businesses that are "just features" certainly count as businesses. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gut_flora http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gut_flora
        jacquesm 17y ago
        > a thing that eats resources and poops profits By that definition large numbers of web 'businesses' are not businesses (yet) because they do not make profits. Their owners might disagree though. And there are plenty of 'real' businesses out there that make a loss. It's really not that simple to put out a definition of what really is a business, but I think that something that lives by the grace of an API as a total dependent on some other company does not count as a business in its own right. Every now and then you come across a rant somewhere from someone that got 'cut off by google' because they depend for 100% of their sales on search engine traffic, and google happened to provide the bigger portion of that. Suddenly they find out that even though they were profitable last month they did not have an actual business, they forgot to realize they were actually a small extension of the google ecosystem and were only able to make a profit because of that. Anybody that has been in business for a while would realize that is an accident waiting to happen. Making your company 100% dependent on FB or Twitter is no different. It's easy money if and when it works, but easy come, easy go.

jacquesm 17y ago

That makes good sense. It also helps cement a business relationship that would be much more solid than the loose structure in place right now. After all, who will you complain to if one day twitter decides that tweetminer has to die. Better if you have a win/win and it costs them too if they shut you down. These 'third party products' on top of other peoples infrastructure are a recent thing, and I have to admit I'm still getting used to it and not really comfortable with it. A project like that should be called a 'feature', it's not an independent business by any definition, even if it does make money.

matthewcford 17y ago
The twitter app I built http://tweetarium.com http://tweetarium.com would benefit from something like this. With regards to twitter pulling the plug on third parities, while it is a worry this could happen, it's risk you factor when building on any platform.
- jacquesm 17y ago
  If at all possible try to differentiate and make your application work with other ways of exchanging messages (such as IM). That way you're not completely dependent on just the one platform. Ebuddy is a nice sample of a company that did that right, they started out as single platform and now support a whole bunch of them.

drawkbox 17y ago

Considering the value of Twitter was really created by all the third-party apps that use it, it is very possible that a model where third-party developers bring in the revenue isn't so far off from what may happen.

mattmaroon 17y ago

Don't worry, you'll be able to. I imagine what's going to happen with Twitter will be the same thing that will happen with Facebook, just faster. They might even beat Facebook across the finish line. It's a pretty simple plan really: 1. Build a product that gets lots of users. (check) 2. Build a platform on it that is easy and compelling to develop for so third parties can build apps. (check) 3. Let developers figure out how to make money off of those apps. (currently in progress) 4. Create a payment system to make accepting payments from Twitter customers as easy as tweeting, take a cut of the revenue from that.

sachinag 17y ago
I think the iPhone and iTMS is the best example of this. If I'm not wrong (and I could be), I thought Zynga was processing payment information on their own servers.
- avdempsey 17y ago
  Zynga has used several partners for payment processing, but yes, they're not relying on Facebook for this service. Actually, Facebook is making a pile of money off of the Mafia/Farm advertising Zynga does.
  - deleted 17y ago
    [deleted]
- mattmaroon 17y ago
  They do, but Facebook is already testing out their payment system. The thing is Facebook customers trust Facebook. Having a stored credit system which could then be used for Facebook gifts and purchases in apps would cause more than a 10% uptick in sales for app devs like Zynga, so Facebook could charge a relatively high processing fee like that and still be worth using. They don't even need to mandate exclusivity to do it. They're working on it right now, and I've enough experience with ads to tell you they're never going to make Google money off of their self-serve stuff. Why is too detailed for this, but suffice it to say their actions make me think they feel the same way, but also agree that their platform can make more.

chaosprophet 17y ago

Perhaps building a micropayment service would get Twitter the much talked about revenue??? An option to pay anybody on Twitter by mobile would be great. Kind of like the App Store, you pay by Twitter and the sum + service charges get added to your monthly phone bill.