It appears that real-time search could finally become a reality. Following our post earlier in the month, Twitter negotiating real-time search deal with Microsoft and Google, it looks like the ink is now drying on an agreement that will see the aforementioned search engines gain complete access to the social media site’s network.
This is a brave new world for search engines and could well change the way we view and use SERPs in the future. Bing and Google are now free to start developing ways to incorporate Twitter feeds into their searches, opening up unique opportunities for the respective engines and their users.
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This time last week, who can honestly say that they had any more than a passing knowledge of oil distributor Trafigura or reputation lawyer firm Carter-Ruck? Whilst there may be a few out there, I’m reasonably confident that those numbers have swollen significantly over the last seven days.
How about Jan Moir? As a former Outstanding Woman Journalist of the Year, respected food critic with The Telegraph and more recently a columnist with The Daily Mail, you’re more likely to have read her work or heard the name discussed somewhere. Although, that said, she was still far from a household name.
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When I posed the question, ‘How will Twitter monetise…?’, at the tail end of last week, I didn’t expect the answer to be quite so immediate. Today it has been announced that Twitter are holding talks with both Google and Microsoft to seal a deal that will see feeds being shown alongside standard search results.
This is a move that has been some time in the making. Bing stole a march on Google at the beginning of July by integrating the tweets of a select band of Twitterati royalty (as covered in our blog post, ‘Bing Unleash Real-Time Search’). Whilst Twitter has struggled to find a way to make money from its hugely popular service, the search engines have been seeking ways to tap into its real-time capabilities. A match made in heaven, surely.
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The $100million Twitter raised last week in venture capital appears to highlight two important things. Firstly, Twitter is still regarded as a growing business worthy of heavy investment. And secondly, it is still unable to monetise itself effectively enough to create its own revenue.
The social media site’s stance against integrating advertising is a bold one, but is it ultimately going to doom Twitter to financial failure?
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Twitter’s rise up through the social media rankings has been nothing short of phenomenal. Backed by a plethora of tech savvy celebrities, the take-up of the micro-blogging service has touched every corner of the globe. But is it an empire built on sand?
From the outside everything seems to be ticking over quite nicely. The site continues to earn new users and is now ranked the 19th largest on the Internet (according to Alexa), so on the face of it everything is going swimmingly. But there are undoubtedly issues, some that could ultimately undermine the service into obscurity.
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It didn’t take long did it? No sooner had Facebook snapped up FriendFeed than they incorporated their live feed style in a ‘Lite’ version.
This stripped down Facebook is only currently available to a selection of Beta testers, of which I am not one, and is offering a service not too dissimilar to Twitter or FriendFeed. The rolling feed of news from contacts isn’t interrupted with irritating applications and endless tabs; just a stripped down communication portal.
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As a nation we generally tend to go for the glass half empty view; inwardly criticising the country’s infrastructure, governance and weather is one thing, but when the attack is from overseas, we Brits aren’t shy in responding.
Humorists on both side of the pond will no doubt enjoy the increasingly personal (and patently ridiculous) attacks from right-wing supporters in the US on our NHS. Our “Orwellian” system of deciding who gains free medical help is indicative of a socialist society, putting the UK in league with Soviet Russia, apparently.
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As reported yesterday – Twitter Has Denial of Service Attack – the micro-blogging site was taken down yesterday along with Facebook and LiveJournal.
The conspiracy theories have started and Mashable have just posed the question about whether this DoS was targeting one man, a blogger in Republic of Georgia with the username Cyxymu.
All very interesting and, of course, we’ll probably never really know the truth of what’s happened here. Twitter, though, have certainly suffered and will no doubt be undertaking a serious review of their security.
Let us know what you think. Was Twitter targeted as part of cyber-terrorism?
The world of football has learnt two important lessons about the Internet in as many days. After yesterday’s announcement that Tranmere Rovers were available to buy on eBay, Tottenham Hotspur striker Darren Bent made the kind of Twitter faux pas that would shame Habitat.
First up Tranmere Rovers though. The small Wirral based club with a big reputation for giant killing may be League 1 also-rans, but they came into focus when their owner reacted furiously to their attempted sale on eBay. At $10m for an opening bid you wouldn’t have thought it would be much of an issue, but Chairman Peter Johnson thinks differently suggesting it’s “not a second hand bike we’re selling.”
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Tweetminster, the definitive home of UK politics on Twitter is set to introduce new and improved functionality following fresh investment. The £100k will be used to develop their Livewire tracker, which traces the latest political trending topics here in the UK with the assistance of The Independent newspaper.
The site itself has come from humble beginnings and looks set to become a major player in the Twitter services sector with their continued development. If you’re looking for UK political news straight from the horse’s mouth Tweetminster has always been the place to go.
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The new Twitter home page has been unveiled. Whilst it may not be the most revolutionary design, it does include one key addition, Twitter search.
Now, without even having to sign up with Twitter, you can immediately take advantage of their search facility and see what the world is talking about. With homepage integration, far more people will be able to access Twitter and use it to track down breaking stories and local news in an instant, regardless of whether they are a member or not.
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Government dossiers are usually of the highest confidentiality and of utmost importance. However, one that has snuck out of Whitehall recently, according to the Daily Mail at least, is quite the opposite. Government ministers have been getting advice on how to use Twitter.
Recognising the ballooning popularity of the social media site, some Internet savvy politicians have already jumped on the Twitter bandwagon. This 20 page guide though is designed to encourage those who haven’t yet taken up the mantle and give them advice on what to write, who to follow and how to interact.
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Tweetmeme is one of the many services that has emerged as a direct result of the huge popularity of social networking site Twitter. They are responsible for providing many sites, including our own, with the ability to instantly Tweet a web page or blog post just by clicking on the green ‘Retweet’ button.
However a new site is soon to be launched that will look to challenge their domination in this unique sector. Retweet.com will have one major advantage over its more established rival; it has a brilliant domain name. Just as I discussed in last week’s post entitled ‘what are domain names really worth?’, clearly there is still a lot of value assigned to the name of your domain.
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When you’re new to Twitter, understanding where to start and what you should be doing can be quite confusing. Yes, you only have to get your message across in a paltry 140 characters, but what should that message be? Who are you actually talking to?
Business users face a particularly tough time. When maintaining a personal Twitter account, the only thing that you really need to worry about is not offending too many of your ‘followers’. As a business though, there’s so much more to consider. How should you market yourself? What style of communication is most suitable? Who is going to be allowed to access the company Twitter account? It’s not as straightforward as you may think.
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TechCrunch aren’t usually adverse to controversy and so it has proved once again. Yesterday a mysterious hacker mailed Michael Arrington’s company offering up some invaluable information on Twitter.
Since then, TechCrunch have clearly been wrestling with the idea of how much information they should release. Arrington goes to great lengths to assure everyone that the mountain of private files and other non-business related details won’t be published, at least not by his company; however he is going to be exposing business related dealings in the coming days.
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