I was wrong on Twitter

Twitter.com Site Info

Well my prediction about Twitter.com reaching its peak, which I was stupid enough to post earlier this year, was a flop.  After some initial post hype drop off Twitter is exploding.

What is striking is how Twitter and Facebook are getting all the benefit from the smartphone Web 3.0 revolution, while Flickr is not.  You would think that a site like Flickr should be gaining massive ground right now.  But Flickr is a hard tool to integrate in to other services.  It is not as open to Application development on top of it as Twitter of Facebook.  Twitter and Facebook embraced the ecosystem.  Facebook was promoted greatly by Mafia Wars and Farmville, which it had to pay nothing to build.  Twitter is gain ground from Web 3.0 services like Foursquare. 

The key to having a winning online service is Integration and Distribution.  Twitter and Facebook have it much better than Flickr and MySpace, so they won.

Twitter; eating my words and loving in

A year ago I speculated on the "decline of Twitter". At the time I speculated that the hype had died down and Twitter might fade. Boy was I wrong.

I think what I got really wrong was the flexible nature of Twitter. A year later I find myself on "The Future and Your" podcast saying why "Twitter was better than Facebook"

Twitter has won me over because of its flexibility. Its core simplicity makes it the global market place for ideas. By using search terms (begun with # many times) or locating on people or places, including some great Web 3.0 mash-ups with Twitter, and the emergence of Foursquare has really turned me in to something of a Twitter evangelist and advocate.

Twitter shows that less can be more and simplicity can be strength. The content is out there, in micro pieces that can be assembled based on person, semantic content, or location. Who, what, where is there. You can look at Tweets over time so you have the ability to mine Twitter on Who, What, Where, and When. I can look at what some key people in a group are doing in North London about Sustainability.

What makes Twitter an killer app is the TinyURL and authentication link in. So I can join other Web 3.0 mash-ups with my Twitter account, and I can follow Twitter searches to new kinds of information.

Facebook is where you find, Twitter is where you meet. Twitter could easily be mashed up in to almost anything you want in a Social Network: a dating site, a political site, a blog, even a organisation tool.

BBC NEWS | Technology | Can Twitter survive the hype cycle?

More news on Twitter:

Another growing Twitter community consists of brands and companies. Everyone from Starbucks to Verizon and from the Red Cross to United Airlines now has a Twitter account.

BBC NEWS | Technology | Can Twitter survive the hype cycle?

"Twitter has changed the way businesses market and communicate with customers," said Marketing Profs' Ann Handley.

"I am a Comcast customer and if I tweet about a problem, I will now get a response via Twitter. This is unprecedented in terms of the way companies have operated in the past. But there are still a lot of companies out there that are not sure how to leverage Twitter."

Twitter itself seems to be in a similar boat when it comes to making money out of the service.

"We are not feeling as dogged as people think about this issue," said Mr Stone.

"We are looking at this this year and want to start showing progress on the revenue front. Right now we have plenty of time and plenty of money in the bank and patient investors. We are here to build a lasting company."

Blogged with the Flock Browser

Students should learn to Twit, blog and wiki.

Source BBC

Primary school pupils should learn how to blog and use internet sites like Twitter and Wikipedia and spend less time studying history, it is claimed.

A review of the primary school curriculum in England will be published in a final report next month.

But the Guardian newspaper says draft copies it has seen shows pupils will no longer have to study the Victorian period or the Second World War.

Ministers said British history would always be a core part of education.

The review of the primary school curriculum was commissioned by Schools Secretary Ed Balls last year and is being drawn up by Sir Jim Rose, former chief of England's schools watchdog, Ofsted.

The Guardian said the draft review requires primary school children to be familiar with blogging, podcasts, Wikipedia and Twitter as sources of information and forms of communication.

They must gain "fluency" in handwriting and keyboard skills, and learn how to use a spell checker alongside how to spell, the article said.

Comment: why not have UK students improve Wikipedia's entries on WWII and Victoria as class projects?