uber.la

I have not been kind in my assessment of Twitter the Company. While I love "tweets:" the concept of short open/public IM updates, I have no love of twitter.com or the fail whale cycling. For all the trumpting of Twitter's value, and how they turned down uber-billions from Facebook, I don't think Twitter the Company is a winning investment. Here's why:

• No one company can OWN a format, or messaging protocol.
• Only 10% of Twitter's server load is a result of people actually using Twitter's site.
• There is nothing unique about a 140c text message.
• Twitter has not figured out how to make ANY MONEY. (Exhibit a: Executweets; b: "Verified"; c. ad revenue model)
• Twitter does not have any control over tweeting. (Exhibit: a. Twitter's new ReTweet funtionality vs RT; b. managing followers and friends via a 20-user-per-page interface; c. fail whale sightings continue)
• Google has very few fail whales with G-mail. (Imagine if g-mail had a 5% "unable to connect" reputation.)
• If you could export and import your TWEET-centric addresses into a more stable system, that worked exactly the same but more reliably, would you?
• Is the brand of Twitter positive or negative?
• Is anyone making money by Tweeting? (besides DellFactoryOutlet and Chris Brogan)

So let's start with the  term "microblogging." Rather than blogging, and actually rather than TWITTER.COM (as a company) the concept of sending out 140 character messages to your friends, colleagues and families is not new. Yes Twitter put some of the process into a nice package, gave the "update" a public brand and identity with the likes of Oprah and Aston and Robert Scoble. But the idea that Twitter will OWN the "update" infrastructure is one that will be dismantled this year. (2010)

What we know of as Twitter, and fondly referred to as the Twittersphere, will become something more clearly described as the STATUSPHERE. While Google WAVE didn't exactly rock the world, the shots have been fired over Twitter's bow. Without a clear revenue model, what will keep us going back to Twitter.com for anything?

There are apps and websites that do Twitter much better than Twitter. And a lot of the "improvements" the Twitter execs and designers try to make are rejected by the users. Just as Google can't OWN email, Twitter.com and Twitter the Company will not OWN the Statusphere. They will own Twitter.com and a proud trophy in the history books of social media in the late 2000s. And maybe folks will still continue to use Twitter the Company's services in 2011, but my guess is there will be better funded, better designed and better monetized "status" applications.

Perhaps the WAVE v2!

@jmacofearth
permalink: http://bit.ly/dead-twitter

Poking at Twitter from the beginning:

• Don’t Panic… But TWITTER IS DEAD, Done, Not Coming Back! NEXT!
• TWITTER FAILS: Harken Tweeps Thy Tweeting Days are Numbered, The End Is Nye
• Twitter Is Just Cresting the WAVE: Google Brings The Goods: Google WAVE
• Twitter Bends Over for Google – Backwards or Whatever – Twitter Will Lose This One
• Guy Kawasaki Phone Home Your Integrity Is Calling < Ghost Tweeting Anyone?
• Gathering Twitter Followers and Jettisoning Them With Powerful Tools
• You Are My Filter *One of My Filters* Thank You for Not Wasting My Time
• Signs You Might Be Working Twitter Too Hard: Or Not *Workin* It At All

Tags: 10% solution, chris brogan, dellfactoryoutlet, gmail, google, google wave v2, status app, status upates, statusphere, twitter, twitter API, twitter the company, twitter.com, twittersphere