Saturday, July 03, 2010

How does Twitter pay the bills?

I've googled around a bit trying to find out how Twitter pay their bills, and how they intend to become profitable in the future (seeing as I can't imagine they are so now). But I haven't found anything except many other people asking the same question. Has anybody seen anything solid? It must be amazingly expensive to run such a super-popular service.

This is something I find highly amusing: on the wiki page for Twitter, it says:
"The Industry Standard has remarked that Twitter's long-term viability is limited by a lack of revenue..."

Only in the Internet age is an income considered optional for a business! Too friggin' funny. This is like saying: "Joe Blow's long-term health outlook is limited by his refusal to eat or drink anything".
The Financial Dictionary says: "When evaluating stocks, revenue growth serves as an indication of a company's health." 
But in the Internet age, it's apparently entirely incidental to the stock value! Nut city.

TTL sez:
How they plan to become profitable? By displaying ads, or rather sponsored tweets.
Mind you, this is all over the net. It was covered by pretty much every newspaper when it was announced in April.


Aha. After 40-something years, it finally bites me in the ass that I don't read news. Thanks, dude.
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8 comments:

Timo Lehtinen said...

How they currently pay their bills? From the money venture capitalists have given them.

How they plan to become profitable? By displaying ads, or rather sponsored tweets.

Mind you, this is all over the net. It was covered by pretty much every newspaper when it was announced in April.

Eolake Stobblehouse said...

Aha. After 40-something years, it finally bites me in the ass that I don't read news. Thanks, dude.

Timo Lehtinen said...

I don't read news either. But I find that twitter functions as an excellent news filter.

It is enough you take a cursory glance at your tweet timeline every now and then, and if there is anything important, you'll get it there (usually much sooner than the rags, too). For example, MJ's death (hospitalization) was reported on twitter before the big news sites had a clue. Same for many other recent items.

Of course, you have to pick who you follow with this in mind. That is how you "set your filter".

Eolake Stobblehouse said...

You're right again.
I think I even blogged this once: Twitter has news within seconds, fastest source on the planet.

But often I forget it, and I tend to cancel people if they have too many tweets which don't interest me.

Michael Burton said...

If you're getting all your news from Twitter, please do me a big favor, and don't vote.

Eolake Stobblehouse said...

Nobody can possibly be informed enough to merit voting. Even if you were informing yourself full time, there is too much misinformation and missing information.

Michael Burton said...

So, democracy is out? What should we use, instead?

Timo Lehtinen said...

If you're getting all your news from Twitter, please do me a big favor, and don't vote.

What has news, from any source, have to do with voting?

Surely you want to pick your candidate based on their philosophical views. And this information you get (1) by examining their voting record; or (2) from them directly. Not from some fucking journo.