Twitter as a product

Let me just briefly give you an overview about Twitter’s problems. If you look at it from a broad, mainstream audience perspective you could simply say: Facebook. That’s obviously very simplified and power users and aficionados will likely disagree. But the fact of the matter is: Most people simply don’t need a tool that allows them to share stuff openly and with the world at large most of the time. What they do want is sharing with their friends and families and Facebook is a lot better at this than Twitter — by design. Or as Ben Thompson regularly puts it: People live inside Facebook. People don’t live inside Twitter.

Of course, there are several exceptions to the rule, otherwise Twitter wouldn’t have any users, but as a general assumption I think the point is valid.

In our Facebook discussion, Hajek made the point that Twitter often appears to be mostly populated by senders aka people who want to ‘promote’ their stuff. Significantly less people go to Twitter to discuss, discover and engage. I think he is right to a certain degree but there are exceptions and I believe these exceptions matter (as in: they are where part of Twitter’s value lies).

Live Capabilites

For instance, Twitter is by far superior when it comes to live events with a broad public interest. Experiencing and discussing the European Soccer Championship, the NBA Finals, X Factor or — in Germany — Tatort is a way better experience on Twitter. Again: By design. Facebook doesn’t need to be in the live business, as it is in the business of relevance and targeting. Its very business model relies on those capabilities. Of course, the question remains: What value is there in being great at live communications? (I have some ideas but they are for another time)

Real-time organization of (social) movements

Related to this, yet I believe worth mentioning separately: This capability of live communication has come to full fruition several times now in the context of social movements. The Arab Spring, #blacklivesmatter and so forth. Interestingly, Dorsey made a point of this by being on stage at Code Conference together with Mckeeson, one of the leading figures of the #blacklivesmatter movement. From a monetization standpoint it’s hard to grasp, but it surely is useful to some people and one might argue that its beneficial to society (at least it has the potential to be). Again, the question remains: What value is there in being the infrastructure for social movements?

Twitter creates fragmented values

Another point that is rather obvious but missing from most analysis I read recently: There is not a Twitter. Every user has a very unique experience depending on who he follows. While this is also true for Facebook, it is magnified by Twitter’s open, asymmetric relationship structure (you can follow people without them having to follow you as well). In practice, this means there are probably hundreds of thousands of networks around particular interests. Many of them have very different modes of using the platform. There is football/soccer Twitter. The people there heavily interact and discuss during live games and beyond. There is [insert music genre of choice] Twitter. There, fans follow artists and interact with them, fans discuss among themselves and artists promote their work. There is tech twitter. The heavily self-promotional business twitter. Content distribution twitter. Comedy twitter. Photography Twitter. The list goes on and on. All have their own social codes and behaviors.

In order to identify the value Twitter creates for each of those communities, a detailed analysis would be in order. For the reasons stated above, I will just give you some non-conclusive assumptions (it would obviously be worthwhile for Twitter to really dig deep into this. I’m confident they do but if they don’t, Ev Williams should give his former co-founder a hint.).