On Fri, Apr 9, 2010 at 18:41, Tim Haines <tmhai...@gmail.com> wrote: > Before anyone rants, let me say congratulations Loren, and congratulations > Twitter. Awesome! Totally awesome!
> :-)
> Tim.
-- Abraham Williams | Developer for hire | http://abrah.am PoseurTech Labs | Projects | http://labs.poseurtech.com This email is: [ ] shareable [x] ask first [ ] private.
But, there's a problem, and I hope I'm not the only seeing it.
Twitter has just kicked all the other developers of Twitter iPhone (and iPad) clients in the teeth. Big time. Now suddenly their products compete with a free product that carries the Twitter brand name, and that has potentially millions of dollars at its disposal for further development.
It's really like they're saying, "We picked the winner. Thanks for everything you've done in the past, but now, screw you."
This would not have been such a huge deal if the developer ecosystem did not play such a huge role in propelling Twitter to where it is today.
Please correct me if I'm wrong.
On Apr 9, 10:41 pm, Tim Haines <tmhai...@gmail.com> wrote:
I am also happy for Loren, he deserves it based purely on the quality of his product. I would like some clarification on the intended future of Tweetie for OS X. The plans for the iPhone and iPad have been made very very clear: stay away. Please clarify the plans for OS X.
But at this point I don't really expect a response, but I need to ask.
I'm surprised that you failed to mention that Twitter can also advertise the heck out of it on Twitter.com and via tweets etc - millions for further development - and very significant marketing resources available too.
I disagree with your sentiment though. Twitter's free to build or buy whatever they want to. As a third party developer it's one of the risks you take on when you start building on someone else's platform. If you don't acknowledge that, you're being naive.
Sure it's going to suck if they do something to harm Favstar, but I'm aware it's a risk - and I'm going to try and keep innovating to keep Favstar useful for users regardless.
On Sat, Apr 10, 2010 at 2:18 PM, Dewald Pretorius <dpr...@gmail.com> wrote: > It's great for Loren.
> But, there's a problem, and I hope I'm not the only seeing it.
> Twitter has just kicked all the other developers of Twitter iPhone > (and iPad) clients in the teeth. Big time. Now suddenly their products > compete with a free product that carries the Twitter brand name, and > that has potentially millions of dollars at its disposal for further > development.
> It's really like they're saying, "We picked the winner. Thanks for > everything you've done in the past, but now, screw you."
> This would not have been such a huge deal if the developer ecosystem > did not play such a huge role in propelling Twitter to where it is > today.
> Please correct me if I'm wrong.
> On Apr 9, 10:41 pm, Tim Haines <tmhai...@gmail.com> wrote: > > Before anyone rants, let me say congratulations Loren, and > congratulations > > Twitter. Awesome! Totally awesome!
> > :-)
> > Tim.
> -- > To unsubscribe, reply using "remove me" as the subject.
> But, there's a problem, and I hope I'm not the only seeing it.
> Twitter has just kicked all the other developers of Twitter iPhone > (and iPad) clients in the teeth. Big time. Now suddenly their products > compete with a free product that carries the Twitter brand name, and > that has potentially millions of dollars at its disposal for further > development.
> It's really like they're saying, "We picked the winner. Thanks for > everything you've done in the past, but now, screw you."
> This would not have been such a huge deal if the developer ecosystem > did not play such a huge role in propelling Twitter to where it is > today.
> Please correct me if I'm wrong.
> On Apr 9, 10:41 pm, Tim Haines <tmhai...@gmail.com> wrote:
> > Before anyone rants, let me say congratulations Loren, and congratulations > > Twitter. Awesome! Totally awesome!
As a twitter user I'm intrigued. As a twitter developer I'm not hoping that you are really close to a statement to reassure us all its ok and maintaining an even playing field. Although renaming it Tweetie to Twitter for iPhone is a hurtful (being "THE" twitter client relegates the others to second instantly in what was an even playing field).
So as a Tweetie user, please add sign up API so my mom and dad can get on Twitter from directly on the iPhone. Please add iPad support. Please also make a purchase of Windows based company to even out Tweetie for Mac venture so Twitter doesn't seem Mac happy, and please buy a Android company to even that side out too.
See you all at Chrip! I'm sure this will be a lively debate so: INB4 insanity
On Fri, Apr 9, 2010 at 7:18 PM, Dewald Pretorius <dpr...@gmail.com> wrote: > It's great for Loren.
> But, there's a problem, and I hope I'm not the only seeing it.
> Twitter has just kicked all the other developers of Twitter iPhone > (and iPad) clients in the teeth. Big time. Now suddenly their products > compete with a free product that carries the Twitter brand name, and > that has potentially millions of dollars at its disposal for further > development.
> It's really like they're saying, "We picked the winner. Thanks for > everything you've done in the past, but now, screw you."
> This would not have been such a huge deal if the developer ecosystem > did not play such a huge role in propelling Twitter to where it is > today.
> Please correct me if I'm wrong.
> On Apr 9, 10:41 pm, Tim Haines <tmhai...@gmail.com> wrote: > > Before anyone rants, let me say congratulations Loren, and > congratulations > > Twitter. Awesome! Totally awesome!
> > :-)
> > Tim.
> -- > To unsubscribe, reply using "remove me" as the subject.
> I'm surprised that you failed to mention that Twitter can also advertise the heck out of it on Twitter.com and via tweets etc - millions for further development - and very significant marketing resources available too.
> I disagree with your sentiment though. Twitter's free to build or buy whatever they want to. As a third party developer it's one of the risks you take on when you start building on someone else's platform. If you don't acknowledge that, you're being naive.
> Sure it's going to suck if they do something to harm Favstar, but I'm aware it's a risk - and I'm going to try and keep innovating to keep Favstar useful for users regardless.
> Tim.
> On Sat, Apr 10, 2010 at 2:18 PM, Dewald Pretorius <dpr...@gmail.com> wrote: > It's great for Loren.
> But, there's a problem, and I hope I'm not the only seeing it.
> Twitter has just kicked all the other developers of Twitter iPhone > (and iPad) clients in the teeth. Big time. Now suddenly their products > compete with a free product that carries the Twitter brand name, and > that has potentially millions of dollars at its disposal for further > development.
> It's really like they're saying, "We picked the winner. Thanks for > everything you've done in the past, but now, screw you."
> This would not have been such a huge deal if the developer ecosystem > did not play such a huge role in propelling Twitter to where it is > today.
> Please correct me if I'm wrong.
> On Apr 9, 10:41 pm, Tim Haines <tmhai...@gmail.com> wrote: > > Before anyone rants, let me say congratulations Loren, and congratulations > > Twitter. Awesome! Totally awesome!
> > :-)
> > Tim.
> -- > To unsubscribe, reply using "remove me" as the subject.
> I am also happy for Loren, he deserves it based purely on the quality > of his product. I would like some clarification on the intended future > of Tweetie for OS X. The plans for the iPhone and iPad have been made > very very clear: stay away. Please clarify the plans for OS X.
Let's just say that I think Nambu is now worth more as the next Sea World whale's name than an OS X Twitter client.
Fortunately, I inhabit the command line and Mac OS 9 markets, so I'm pretty sure I'm safe.
-- ------------------------------------ personal: http://www.cameronkaiser.com/ -- Cameron Kaiser * Floodgap Systems * www.floodgap.com * ckai...@floodgap.com -- I use my C128 because I am an ornery, stubborn, retro grouch. -- Bob Masse -
>> I am also happy for Loren, he deserves it based purely on the quality >> of his product. I would like some clarification on the intended future >> of Tweetie for OS X. The plans for the iPhone and iPad have been made >> very very clear: stay away. Please clarify the plans for OS X.
> Let's just say that I think Nambu is now worth more as the next Sea World > whale's name than an OS X Twitter client.
> Fortunately, I inhabit the command line and Mac OS 9 markets, so I'm > pretty sure I'm safe.
Uh ... "market" implies that people will actually *pay* for something. I haven't found that to be the case for command line tools. ;-) Don't know about OS 9, though - last time I was "asked" to use one of those (summer 2004), I politely declined and did everything on my dual-booted Windows XP / Linux laptop. ;-)
But that does raise an interesting question - I'm not overly impressed with any of the open-source GUI Twitter clients, and I won't run an AIR application on my Linux desktop - AIR is a resource hog (and closed). So I stick with web-based clients like the Twitter home page, HootSuite or CoTweet. Is there any energy out there for a *really good* open source Twitter GUI client that would run on Linux, Mac and Windows?
And the congratulations belong to *both* Loren and Twitter! ;-)
-- M. Edward (Ed) Borasky borasky-research.net/ @znmeb
"A mathematician is a device for turning coffee into theorems." ~ Paul Erdős
> Uh ... "market" implies that people will actually *pay* for something. I > haven't found that to be the case for command line tools. ;-) Don't know > about OS 9, though - last time I was "asked" to use one of those (summer > 2004), I politely declined and did everything on my dual-booted Windows > XP / Linux laptop. ;-)
Thanks so much for clarifying. :-P
-- ------------------------------------ personal: http://www.cameronkaiser.com/ -- Cameron Kaiser * Floodgap Systems * www.floodgap.com * ckai...@floodgap.com -- TODAY'S DUMB TRUE HEADLINE: Plane Too Close to Ground, Crash Probe Told ----
First I would like to also congratulate Tweetie on a job well done. Best of luck!
Will this be the end all to clients as we know it? It maybe, but like all markets there is that inevitable peak. Sooner or later the winners will be picked and the rest discarded. That is a hard and painful fact we have to live with in life. I still encourage other client developers to keep going strong. Loyal users will stay with you as long as they are kept happy. Innovation is gold and if you build a great product you have not much to worry about.
I personally will probably not be touching the client area, at least not from a business stance. Sure I might do one as a hobby project, but it is time to pack up and move to greener pastures. There is still much unexplored areas we can still cover with the API and Twitter has been good so far at giving us more and more room to grow our applications.
Keep an open mind and stay optimistic about the future.
On Apr 9, 10:58 pm, "M. Edward (Ed) Borasky" <zn...@comcast.net> wrote:
> But that does raise an interesting question - I'm not overly impressed > with any of the open-source GUI Twitter clients, and I won't run an AIR > application on my Linux desktop - AIR is a resource hog (and closed). So > I stick with web-based clients like the Twitter home page, HootSuite or > CoTweet. Is there any energy out there for a *really good* open source > Twitter GUI client that would run on Linux, Mac and Windows?
Define "energy." Spaz has been out there and FOSS since mid 2007. Moving off AIR and doing lots of other good things have been in my plans for a long time, but open source in no way means people want to help you. No one will be even close to your own interest level.
FWIW, I'm leaning towards deploying Spaz as a hosted FOSS web app -- that is, you could use my server, or DL and host it yourself. It would focus on providing a good experience for touch-based clients particularly. When that will happen is pretty much dictated by who else takes interest.
Integrating well with StatusNet's server software seems pretty appealing right now.
On Fri, Apr 9, 2010 at 20:22, funkatron <funkat...@gmail.com> wrote:
> On Apr 9, 10:58 pm, "M. Edward (Ed) Borasky" <zn...@comcast.net> > wrote:
> > But that does raise an interesting question - I'm not overly impressed > > with any of the open-source GUI Twitter clients, and I won't run an AIR > > application on my Linux desktop - AIR is a resource hog (and closed). So > > I stick with web-based clients like the Twitter home page, HootSuite or > > CoTweet. Is there any energy out there for a *really good* open source > > Twitter GUI client that would run on Linux, Mac and Windows?
> Define "energy." Spaz has been out there and FOSS since mid 2007. > Moving off AIR and doing lots of other good things have been in my > plans for a long time, but open source in no way means people want to > help you. No one will be even close to your own interest level.
> FWIW, I'm leaning towards deploying Spaz as a hosted FOSS web app -- > that is, you could use my server, or DL and host it yourself. It would > focus on providing a good experience for touch-based clients > particularly. When that will happen is pretty much dictated by who > else takes interest.
> Integrating well with StatusNet's server software seems pretty > appealing right now.
> -- > To unsubscribe, reply using "remove me" as the subject.
-- Abraham Williams | Developer for hire | http://abrah.am PoseurTech Labs | Projects | http://labs.poseurtech.com This email is: [ ] shareable [x] ask first [ ] private.
> Define "energy." Spaz has been out there and FOSS since mid 2007. > Moving off AIR and doing lots of other good things have been in my > plans for a long time, but open source in no way means people want to > help you. No one will be even close to your own interest level.
Open source depends on the fact that it is in the interest of major corporations like IBM, Novell, Oracle, Google, Dell and others to support it. I quite frankly don't know why some other large corporations don't join the party - there are just so many wheels you can re-invent before your bottom line goes to Hell in a hand-basket.
> FWIW, I'm leaning towards deploying Spaz as a hosted FOSS web app -- > that is, you could use my server, or DL and host it yourself. It would > focus on providing a good experience for touch-based clients > particularly. When that will happen is pretty much dictated by who > else takes interest.
I should look at Spaz, I guess, although I'm dead-set against ever installing AIR again. I loaded one of the AIR-based Twitter desktops - I don't remember which one - and the process was brutal. The client itself sucked too, so there was no reason to keep it or AIR.
I'm not sure I'd use a web-based client other than Twitter's at this point. HootSuite and CoTweet are moving towards being marketing / CRM add-ons to all the social networks. If that was what I was doing, I'd simply use SugarCRM (another fine open-source corporate project) with Twitter and Facebook plug-ins. ;-)
> Integrating well with StatusNet's server software seems pretty > appealing right now.
Yeah, I keep meaning to look at StatusNet, although I'm not sure when I'll find the time. They've got a huge wall to climb.
-- M. Edward (Ed) Borasky borasky-research.net @znmeb
"A mathematician is a device for turning coffee into theorems." ~ Paul Erdős
StatusNet is in an interesting position. They can't, and I don't think have to, compete directly with Twitter. Offering both SAAS and self- hosted opportunities is compelling, and they have a pretty strong dev community. They already have Twitter and Facebook two-way bridges built in, which means you can run your own thing and still interact with both of those services.
I'm interested in the idea of complementing StatusNet in a similar fashion on the client side, as a true FOSS tool, extensible via a plugin architecture.
> > Define "energy." Spaz has been out there and FOSS since mid 2007. > > Moving off AIR and doing lots of other good things have been in my > > plans for a long time, but open source in no way means people want to > > help you. No one will be even close to your own interest level.
> Open source depends on the fact that it is in the interest of major > corporations like IBM, Novell, Oracle, Google, Dell and others to > support it. I quite frankly don't know why some other large corporations > don't join the party - there are just so many wheels you can re-invent > before your bottom line goes to Hell in a hand-basket.
> > FWIW, I'm leaning towards deploying Spaz as a hosted FOSS web app -- > > that is, you could use my server, or DL and host it yourself. It would > > focus on providing a good experience for touch-based clients > > particularly. When that will happen is pretty much dictated by who > > else takes interest.
> I should look at Spaz, I guess, although I'm dead-set against ever > installing AIR again. I loaded one of the AIR-based Twitter desktops - I > don't remember which one - and the process was brutal. The client itself > sucked too, so there was no reason to keep it or AIR.
> I'm not sure I'd use a web-based client other than Twitter's at this > point. HootSuite and CoTweet are moving towards being marketing / CRM > add-ons to all the social networks. If that was what I was doing, I'd > simply use SugarCRM (another fine open-source corporate project) with > Twitter and Facebook plug-ins. ;-)
> > Integrating well with StatusNet's server software seems pretty > > appealing right now.
> Yeah, I keep meaning to look at StatusNet, although I'm not sure when > I'll find the time. They've got a huge wall to climb.
> -- > M. Edward (Ed) Borasky > borasky-research.net @znmeb
> "A mathematician is a device for turning coffee into theorems." ~ Paul Erdős
the way that i usually explain twitter.com (the web site) is that it embodies one particular experience of "twitter". twitter.com needs to implement almost every feature that twitter builds, and needs to implement it in a way that is easy to use for the* lowest common denominator of user*. this now also holds for the iphone. so, one possible answer for how to innovate and do potentially interesting/lucrative/creative things is to simply not target the lowest common denominator user anymore. find a particular need, and not the generic need, and blow it out of the water.
what i am most interested in seeing is apps that break out of the mold and do things differently. ever since i joined the twitter platform, our team has built APIs that directly mirror the twitter.com experience -- 3rd party developers have taken those, and mimicked the twitter.com experience. for example, countless apps simply fetch timelines from the API and just render them. can we start to do more creative things?
i don't have any great potentials off the top of my head (its midnight where i am now, and i flew in on a red-eye last night), but here are a few potential ones. i'm sure more creative application developers can come up with more. i want to see applications for people that:
- don't have time to sit and watch twitter 24/7/365. while i love to scan through my timeline, frankly, that's a lot of content. can you summarize it for me? can you do something better than chronological sort? - want to understand what's going on around them. how do i discover people talking about the place i currently am? how do i know this restaurant is good? this involves user discovery, place discovery, content analysis, etc. - want to see what people are talking about a particular tv show, news article, or any piece of live-real-world content in real time. how can twitter be a "second/third/fourth screen" to the world?
perhaps the OS X music playback app market is a poor example? sure itunes is a dominant app, but last.fm, spotify, etc., all exist and are doing things that itunes can't do.
> On Apr 9, 10:18 pm, Dewald Pretorius <dpr...@gmail.com> wrote: > > It's great for Loren.
> > But, there's a problem, and I hope I'm not the only seeing it.
> > Twitter has just kicked all the other developers of Twitter iPhone > > (and iPad) clients in the teeth. Big time. Now suddenly their products > > compete with a free product that carries the Twitter brand name, and > > that has potentially millions of dollars at its disposal for further > > development.
> > It's really like they're saying, "We picked the winner. Thanks for > > everything you've done in the past, but now, screw you."
> > This would not have been such a huge deal if the developer ecosystem > > did not play such a huge role in propelling Twitter to where it is > > today.
> > Please correct me if I'm wrong.
> > On Apr 9, 10:41 pm, Tim Haines <tmhai...@gmail.com> wrote:
> > > Before anyone rants, let me say congratulations Loren, and > congratulations > > > Twitter. Awesome! Totally awesome!
Congrats to Loren and the Twitter Corp Dev/Mobile teams!
Yes, the desktop app will follow. Then likely a Windows version. I've got no vested interest in being right or wrong, but it makes sense, and it's been inevitable for quite a while. Ever since the hint of an ad model. Organic eyeballs mean less money out the door to other publishers/apps/etc. Good business means Twitter will want as many eyeballs as possible on their own products.
I feel for any developers who are impacted, I hope they pivot successfully and prosper from here. I hope I'm never in the same situation. That said, this should not be surprising to anyone.
At the very least, the strategy is more apparent now and everyone can act accordingly.
It is, of course, possible to find niches here, and we can of course come up with ideas that could work. I certainly am not debating that.
But you have to admit that this is a big, big bomb to drop in the development community; bigger than anything since *maybe* the Summize acquisition, and the whole shebang was a lot smaller then. And Summize was doing work that most developers couldn't do, because of the technical issues involved.
And I might also suggest that choice and diversity is generally a good thing, even in areas you personally find boring. But perhaps not in the financial sense for Twitter, which is why stuff like this happens.
It's not really just what was done, but *how* it was done that was most disappointing. And I bet you didn't have anything to do with that, so not much to say there.
Actually, I suspect iTunes is a great analogy, even with the other apps you suggest. iTunes did destroy any competition in the primary music playback app market, and I believe (anecdotally though) that it dominates the lowest common denominator market -- also the largest part of the market. I'll be happy to buy you a drink when Spotify and and last.fm combined hit 50% of iTunes usage. They are the niche apps along the lines you suggest we should be making.
> the way that i usually explain twitter.com (the web site) is that it > embodies one particular experience of "twitter". twitter.com needs to > implement almost every feature that twitter builds, and needs to implement > it in a way that is easy to use for the* lowest common denominator of user*. > this now also holds for the iphone. so, one possible answer for how to > innovate and do potentially interesting/lucrative/creative things is to > simply not target the lowest common denominator user anymore. find a > particular need, and not the generic need, and blow it out of the water.
> what i am most interested in seeing is apps that break out of the mold and > do things differently. ever since i joined the twitter platform, our team > has built APIs that directly mirror the twitter.com experience -- 3rd party > developers have taken those, and mimicked the twitter.com experience. for > example, countless apps simply fetch timelines from the API and just render > them. can we start to do more creative things?
> i don't have any great potentials off the top of my head (its midnight where > i am now, and i flew in on a red-eye last night), but here are a few > potential ones. i'm sure more creative application developers can come up > with more. i want to see applications for people that:
> - don't have time to sit and watch twitter 24/7/365. while i love to > scan through my timeline, frankly, that's a lot of content. can you > summarize it for me? can you do something better than chronological sort? > - want to understand what's going on around them. how do i discover > people talking about the place i currently am? how do i know this > restaurant is good? this involves user discovery, place discovery, content > analysis, etc. > - want to see what people are talking about a particular tv show, news > article, or any piece of live-real-world content in real time. how can > twitter be a "second/third/fourth screen" to the world?
> perhaps the OS X music playback app market is a poor example? sure itunes > is a dominant app, but last.fm, spotify, etc., all exist and are doing > things that itunes can't do.
> On Fri, Apr 9, 2010 at 7:26 PM, funkatron <funkat...@gmail.com> wrote: > > Twitter did this to BB clients too, today.
> > You think this is the last platform they'll do an Official Client on?
> > Take a look at the OS X music playback app market to see the future of > > Twitter clients.
> > On Apr 9, 10:18 pm, Dewald Pretorius <dpr...@gmail.com> wrote: > > > It's great for Loren.
> > > But, there's a problem, and I hope I'm not the only seeing it.
> > > Twitter has just kicked all the other developers of Twitter iPhone > > > (and iPad) clients in the teeth. Big time. Now suddenly their products > > > compete with a free product that carries the Twitter brand name, and > > > that has potentially millions of dollars at its disposal for further > > > development.
> > > It's really like they're saying, "We picked the winner. Thanks for > > > everything you've done in the past, but now, screw you."
> > > This would not have been such a huge deal if the developer ecosystem > > > did not play such a huge role in propelling Twitter to where it is > > > today.
> > > Please correct me if I'm wrong.
> > > On Apr 9, 10:41 pm, Tim Haines <tmhai...@gmail.com> wrote:
> > > > Before anyone rants, let me say congratulations Loren, and > > congratulations > > > > Twitter. Awesome! Totally awesome!
> It is, of course, possible to find niches here, and we can of course > come up with ideas that could work. I certainly am not debating that.
> But you have to admit that this is a big, big bomb to drop in the > development community; bigger than anything since *maybe* the Summize > acquisition, and the whole shebang was a lot smaller then. And > Summize was doing work that most developers couldn't do, because of > the technical issues involved.
> And I might also suggest that choice and diversity is generally a good > thing, even in areas you personally find boring. But perhaps not in > the financial sense for Twitter, which is why stuff like this happens.
> It's not really just what was done, but *how* it was done that was > most disappointing. And I bet you didn't have anything to do with > that, so not much to say there.
> Actually, I suspect iTunes is a great analogy, even with the other > apps you suggest. iTunes did destroy any competition in the primary > music playback app market, and I believe (anecdotally though) that it > dominates the lowest common denominator market -- also the largest > part of the market. I'll be happy to buy you a drink when Spotify and > and last.fm combined hit 50% of iTunes usage. They are the niche apps > along the lines you suggest we should be making.
> On Apr 10, 12:20 am, Raffi Krikorian <ra...@twitter.com> wrote:
> > the way that i usually explain twitter.com (the web site) is that it > > embodies one particular experience of "twitter". twitter.com needs to > > implement almost every feature that twitter builds, and needs to implement > > it in a way that is easy to use for the* lowest common denominator of user*. > > this now also holds for the iphone. so, one possible answer for how to > > innovate and do potentially interesting/lucrative/creative things is to > > simply not target the lowest common denominator user anymore. find a > > particular need, and not the generic need, and blow it out of the water.
> > what i am most interested in seeing is apps that break out of the mold and > > do things differently. ever since i joined the twitter platform, our team > > has built APIs that directly mirror the twitter.com experience -- 3rd party > > developers have taken those, and mimicked the twitter.com experience. for > > example, countless apps simply fetch timelines from the API and just render > > them. can we start to do more creative things?
> > i don't have any great potentials off the top of my head (its midnight where > > i am now, and i flew in on a red-eye last night), but here are a few > > potential ones. i'm sure more creative application developers can come up > > with more. i want to see applications for people that:
> > - don't have time to sit and watch twitter 24/7/365. while i love to > > scan through my timeline, frankly, that's a lot of content. can you > > summarize it for me? can you do something better than chronological sort? > > - want to understand what's going on around them. how do i discover > > people talking about the place i currently am? how do i know this > > restaurant is good? this involves user discovery, place discovery, content > > analysis, etc. > > - want to see what people are talking about a particular tv show, news > > article, or any piece of live-real-world content in real time. how can > > twitter be a "second/third/fourth screen" to the world?
> > perhaps the OS X music playback app market is a poor example? sure itunes > > is a dominant app, but last.fm, spotify, etc., all exist and are doing > > things that itunes can't do.
> > On Fri, Apr 9, 2010 at 7:26 PM, funkatron <funkat...@gmail.com> wrote: > > > Twitter did this to BB clients too, today.
> > > You think this is the last platform they'll do an Official Client on?
> > > Take a look at the OS X music playback app market to see the future of > > > Twitter clients.
> > > On Apr 9, 10:18 pm, Dewald Pretorius <dpr...@gmail.com> wrote: > > > > It's great for Loren.
> > > > But, there's a problem, and I hope I'm not the only seeing it.
> > > > Twitter has just kicked all the other developers of Twitter iPhone > > > > (and iPad) clients in the teeth. Big time. Now suddenly their products > > > > compete with a free product that carries the Twitter brand name, and > > > > that has potentially millions of dollars at its disposal for further > > > > development.
> > > > It's really like they're saying, "We picked the winner. Thanks for > > > > everything you've done in the past, but now, screw you."
> > > > This would not have been such a huge deal if the developer ecosystem > > > > did not play such a huge role in propelling Twitter to where it is > > > > today.
> > > > Please correct me if I'm wrong.
> > > > On Apr 9, 10:41 pm, Tim Haines <tmhai...@gmail.com> wrote:
> > > > > Before anyone rants, let me say congratulations Loren, and > > > congratulations > > > > > Twitter. Awesome! Totally awesome!
> - don't have time to sit and watch twitter 24/7/365. while i love to > scan through my timeline, frankly, that's a lot of content. can you > summarize it for me? can you do something better than chronological sort?
Yeah ... I think a fair number of people want something like that. If Twitter would like to build it, grab me at Chirp and I'll give you some pointers to the relevant NLP literature. It's not a small enough project for a single-man shop like myself.
> - want to understand what's going on around them. how do i discover > people talking about the place i currently am? how do i know this > restaurant is good? this involves user discovery, place discovery, content > analysis, etc.
I think that ship has sailed, and the liner companies are Google, Yahoo, Yelp, Foursquare, Gowalla, Facebook, etc. Twitter's way late to that party. I'm not saying there aren't opportunities in location-based services - in fact, I think Twitter's cautious approach to a subject that others seem to be gung-ho about is the strategically correct one. But Twitter had a really cool location demo at SxSW and just about everybody ignored it and focused on the Foursquare / Gowalla smackdown. And everyone is waiting for Facebook to drop the other shoe.
Then again, I haven't heard about @anywhere yet. ;-)
> - want to see what people are talking about a particular tv show, news > article, or any piece of live-real-world content in real time. how can > twitter be a "second/third/fourth screen" to the world?
Now *that* one I like! Twitter as the world's real-time newspaper, complete with weather, sports, traffic, celebrity gossip, letters to the editor, etc. I think you could wipe "USA Today" off the map (pun intended).
-- M. Edward (Ed) Borasky borasky-research.net @znmeb
"A mathematician is a device for turning coffee into theorems." ~ Paul Erdős
> But, there's a problem, and I hope I'm not the only seeing it.
you're not the only one seeing it ;-)
I guess the fact that Twitter clients played a major role in Twitter's "success" is making this move so special. On the other hand, I think it was inevitable, wasn't it? Twitter needs to make money some time soon - and with so much traffic coming in via "uncontrollable" clients ...
Anyway, I'm happy for Loren and Tweetie. Looks like a fair game on the iPhone platform at least - where any of the top clients could have won the "jackpot" :-)
Twitter has now displayed a distinctive predatorial stance towards the developer ecosystem.
The ecosystem is encouraged to innovate, to expend time, effort, and money to come up with new ideas and build services. When that particular space proves to be successful and potentially rewarding, the predator pounces and screws everyone but the one picked as the winner.
In the long term, the acquisition of Tweetie was a penny-wise pound- foolish move, and here's why:
1) From now on, everyone will know, or at least wonder, whether encouragement and support for the ecosystem is genuine, or simply a facade to cultivate the next space that Twitter can plunder.
2) Innovation is stifled, because to many it now is not worth their effort, time, and money to develop services that stand a very good chance of receiving a similar kick in the teeth.
3) In one single day, in one fell swoop, many developers have been turned away from Twitter. Few people have the level of imagination required to build new mouse traps, and fewer have the resources to build sophisticated new mouse traps. You will never hear from these developers who have been turned away. You will never know who they are and how many there were. They've just disappeared in the mist.
You don't do this. You don't ride to success on the coattails and efforts of others and then turn around and plunder them. It is wrong.
Twitter is not the first to do this, but it still does not make it right.
PS. Sorry for the duplicate. I initially posted this to the incorrect thread.
In support of what Raffi is saying, I think too many apps are "supports" for Twitter (some call it "filling holes"). I think the more beneficial, and long-term advantageous approach is instead to make Twitter a "support" for your application. I hope this isn't seen as spam, but I wrote about this last night in where I suggest we re-evaluate what our "cores" are based on: http://staynalive.com/articles/2010/04/10/what-is-your-core/
The Twitter app ecosystem is far from dead, is still thriving - we just need to re-evaluate where our cores are based. I think Twitter has drawn the line in the sand on what their core is. It's time we adjust ours so we're using Twitter as a complement, rather than the other way around. Just my $.02 - see you at Chirp!
On Fri, Apr 9, 2010 at 10:20 PM, Raffi Krikorian <ra...@twitter.com> wrote: > the way that i usually explain twitter.com (the web site) is that it > embodies one particular experience of "twitter". twitter.com needs to > implement almost every feature that twitter builds, and needs to implement > it in a way that is easy to use for the* lowest common denominator of user > *. this now also holds for the iphone. so, one possible answer for how > to innovate and do potentially interesting/lucrative/creative things is to > simply not target the lowest common denominator user anymore. find a > particular need, and not the generic need, and blow it out of the water.
> what i am most interested in seeing is apps that break out of the mold and > do things differently. ever since i joined the twitter platform, our team > has built APIs that directly mirror the twitter.com experience -- 3rd > party developers have taken those, and mimicked the twitter.comexperience. for example, countless apps simply fetch timelines from the API > and just render them. can we start to do more creative things?
> i don't have any great potentials off the top of my head (its midnight > where i am now, and i flew in on a red-eye last night), but here are a few > potential ones. i'm sure more creative application developers can come up > with more. i want to see applications for people that:
> - don't have time to sit and watch twitter 24/7/365. while i love to > scan through my timeline, frankly, that's a lot of content. can you > summarize it for me? can you do something better than chronological sort? > - want to understand what's going on around them. how do i discover > people talking about the place i currently am? how do i know this > restaurant is good? this involves user discovery, place discovery, content > analysis, etc. > - want to see what people are talking about a particular tv show, news > article, or any piece of live-real-world content in real time. how can > twitter be a "second/third/fourth screen" to the world?
> perhaps the OS X music playback app market is a poor example? sure > itunes is a dominant app, but last.fm, spotify, etc., all exist and are > doing things that itunes can't do.
> On Fri, Apr 9, 2010 at 7:26 PM, funkatron <funkat...@gmail.com> wrote:
>> Twitter did this to BB clients too, today.
>> You think this is the last platform they'll do an Official Client on?
>> Take a look at the OS X music playback app market to see the future of >> Twitter clients.
>> On Apr 9, 10:18 pm, Dewald Pretorius <dpr...@gmail.com> wrote: >> > It's great for Loren.
>> > But, there's a problem, and I hope I'm not the only seeing it.
>> > Twitter has just kicked all the other developers of Twitter iPhone >> > (and iPad) clients in the teeth. Big time. Now suddenly their products >> > compete with a free product that carries the Twitter brand name, and >> > that has potentially millions of dollars at its disposal for further >> > development.
>> > It's really like they're saying, "We picked the winner. Thanks for >> > everything you've done in the past, but now, screw you."
>> > This would not have been such a huge deal if the developer ecosystem >> > did not play such a huge role in propelling Twitter to where it is >> > today.
>> > Please correct me if I'm wrong.
>> > On Apr 9, 10:41 pm, Tim Haines <tmhai...@gmail.com> wrote:
>> > > Before anyone rants, let me say congratulations Loren, and >> congratulations >> > > Twitter. Awesome! Totally awesome!
