It’s probably time to make a post on Twitter. Hmm..
I just ran a quick search on TechCrunch and realized that Twitter has become really big – at least in terms of buzz received in the Tech/Geek scene. Here some numbers:
Twitter has been mentioned in 623 posts on Techcrunch - quite amazing when you compare this to services that have been around much longer.
While the blogsphere quite obviously has been all abuzz about twitter, it seems that by now the still rather young and new service is starting to take off among mainstream users as well.
Here some issues that make me think that Twitter could indeed be the „next big thing“:
1. Exploding user numbers
2. Increasing connectedness of members
3. First mover advantage materialized and fully captured
Competitors have missed the train and were driven out of the market (even if they had a better service) – at least in the B2C market.
In the B2B market it is a different ballgame, enterprise microblogging solutions are emerging as this list here shows.
4. Massive open innovation brought about by public API
The numbers of services that are built around or on top of or are in some other way connected with the twitter infrastructure are exploding. Here a short list:
- My current favorites: TweetDeck, Peoplebrowsr
- Some others: Twitturly, ToAnswer, Twellow & TwitDir, TwitterCounter, TwitPic, TwitterMail, TwitterFox, GroupTweet, Be-A-Magpie, ...
-->Find a more exhaustive list here
I am impressed by the creative potential that open innovation can unleash. Anecdotes like the one below fascinate me: Loic Lemeur, an entrepreneur and thought leader in the Tech sphere has raised the idea in his blog that there should be a new for of search available for Twitter. No 24 hours later, this was realized by a bunch of coders that read his post – here is what they answered him:
“Since I read your post this morning about authority based twitter searches I’ve been frantically trying to come up with a solution with some friends. 12 hours and numerous cups of coffee later I think we’ve cracked it.
You can now perform authority based twitter searches at http://twitority.com”
5. $500m valuations
Even if that’s a „hype-price“ and boils down to a dehyped $150m - that’s a lot! SAI goes even further:
"Twitter could eventually be worth more than $1 billion. Why? Because they'll figure out a revenue model eventually, just like Google did. Why is Twitter different than the 9,000 other Web 2.0 companies that are intending to figure out a revenue model eventually? Because people are obsessed with it. "
Some of my thoughts about Twitter
- It looks like twitter has been discovered as a tool to communicate among a team of entrepreneurial researchers: Evidence that successful innovation cannot be strategically planned but rather evolves naturally if the upfront investment (time, skill, money, etc) is low enough?
- Why are some very smart people (e.g. Bruno Guissani) not buying it?
- Having raised $22m from Union Square Ventures, Digital Garage, Spark Capital, and Bezos Expeditions – how will the service monetize? Advertisement again? Probably. Or can a service that revolutionizes communication also revolutionize common forms of advertisment? We can expect interesting news in Q1 or Q2 2009
- When will twitter pass the “mama-test” (i.e. my mother is also using it). Facebook has done it, will twitter be able to do so as well?
Some follow-up reading you might enjoy:
- State of the Twittersphere
- Wikipedia
- Jeremiah Owyangs thoughts on Twitter
Updates:
- Just got emailed the link to the following post: Why Twitter will go mainstream in 2009
- What and why ist Twitter:
Recommended Reading: The Crisis hasn't shaken the cost of capital - McKinsey Quarterly
There is a noteworthy article in the latest McKinsey Quarterly called "Why the crisis hasn’t shaken the cost of capital"!
The main points: Not the cost of capital (price of risk) has risen (at least not the long-term CoC) but instead, cash flows have become much more uncertain. You should be aware of this since the Cost of capital is usually a major driver for M&A as well as for making investment decisions.
Cost of Equity
- Market prices: Are down about 15-20% of LT rate. 2007 levels were inflated due to overproportional weighting of financial, petroleum & mining sectors. Consumer staples offers more reasonable estimate since earnings more stable.
- Profits: decline in LT cumulative GDP will be reflected in proportion in corporate earnings
- All taken together, this raises CoE about one half point.
- However, not included are market tendency to overreact to recessions & sharper ST drop in corporate profits
Cost of Debt
- Despite growing spreads, corporate debt is still cheap compared to past 40yr averages (median range of about 8%).
- Spreads are increasing because high demand for Gov-bonds depresses gov-yields - not because investment grade corp bonds are becoming more risky.
- Rates and spreads of last years were probably unsustainably low and the current reaction is a reversion towards more reasonable levels
- CoD is much smaller portion in WACC (tax-shield, conservative debt levels currently)
-->Remaining uncertainty: LT inflation or deflation
Click to read more and find some charts from the article:
Robert Foster on the essence of capitalism
The essence of capitalism is capitalizing—bringing forward the future value of cash to the present so that society can grow more quickly by taking risks. It goes back to the Dutchmen in the 16th century, sitting at their coffeehouses in Amsterdam and Leiden, loaning each other money for a guaranteed return. Someone said, “I’ll give you a little higher return if you give me a piece of the action”—and equity was invented. That had the effect of bringing forward, into real cash today, the net present value of future earnings. That levered society and allowed it to grow at a much higher rate than it would otherwise have. Equity was a very clever invention, and we are not going to give it up. This is the way people are. This is the way commerce works and will continue to work unless capitalism ends. And that won’t happen, regardless of what you read in the press. (McKinsey Quarterly December 2008)
McKinsey Quarterly December 2008
Test-driving Google FriendConnect on the DKW
I'm quite excited today as I am test-driving Google FriendConnect for the DKW site. This will allow several things. On the one hand, it will enable me and everyone else who has got a homepage to embed widgets - things with a specific functionality (as seen in 1 below). Second, it allows me and everyone with a homepage to add a social network to the site in seconds (as seen in 2 below). Last but not least, Friendconnect enables the inclusion of widgets which interact with this social network - in particular OpenSocial applications compatible with FriendConnect. In essence, I can now leverage my social network on my homepage.
OK, that's not new, since Google along with Facebook and MySpace have announced this type of functionality quite a while back. Here is what Google said about FriendConnect back in May:
Websites that are not social networks may still want to be social -- and now they can be, easily. With Google Friend Connect (see http://www.google.com/friendconnect following this evening's Campfire One), any website owner can add a snippet of code to his or her site and get social features up and running immediately without programming -- picking and choosing from built-in functionality like user registration, invitations, members gallery, message posting, and reviews, as well as third-party applications built by the OpenSocial developer community.
It is now live and working - which makes the possibilities FriendConnect offers more directly visible on a personal page.
Below I have attached a screenshot that shows how easy it is to create a page widget. It comes down to customizing your application and uploading a code snippet to your site - just as you would embed a youtube video.
More background info on Google FriendConnect, Facebook Connect & MySpace Data Availability here:
TechCrunch, Dare Obasanjo (Tip!)
Worth sharing: Smule iPhone apps
This is really cool! The iPhone has in many ways triggered innovative applications, but the smule apps are really something special. Smule makes the iPhone a music instrument (!) - check it out below
and here is what you can do with this:
finally the lighter app, also by Smule and how it spreads around the world. Amazing!
About success and failure - a small piece of inspiration
I just ran by a post by Will Price that I felt was worth sharing:
A list of Abraham Lincoln failures (along with a few successes) follows:
- 1831 - Lost his job
- 1832 - Defeated in run for Illinois State Legislature
- 1833 - Failed in business
- 1834 - Elected to Illinois State Legislature (success)
- 1835 - Sweetheart died
- 1836 - Had nervous breakdown
- 1838 - Defeated in run for Illinois House Speaker
- 1843 - Defeated in run for nomination for U.S. Congress
- 1846 - Elected to Congress (success)
- 1848 - Lost re-nomination
- 1849 - Rejected for land officer position
- 1854 - Defeated in run for U.S. Senate
- 1856 - Defeated in run for nomination for Vice President
- 1858 - Again defeated in run for U.S. Senate
- 1860 - Elected President (success)
from good to great :)
Shopit - a startup with the potential to start big!
To start off, let me reassure you – no, I will not become Techcrunchy. Too many blogs will just copy and paste headlines from Techcrunch, Mashable, Readwriteweb, and the rest of the bunch.
But I will post about what I believe are great ideas. Startups in the digital sphere usually pick up on one central idea, the solution to a problem of future customers. If that value proposition is really compelling, I will share my thoughts.
Meet Shopit, a copmany that has just received a moderate $2.5mio funding infusion by Emerson Ventures.
Here's what Tradevibes has to say about the startup: “Shopit is a simple to use commerce platform that enables efficient sharing and publishing of products and information anywhere online.
Products and Services can be directly linked, from Shopit to any site, including popular destination properties like MySpace, FaceBook, Bebo, Friendster, Blogger, LiveJournal, Xanga and many more.
Shopit enables users within these networks to buy and sell goods and services. Shopit's free commerce platform provides 100 percent Identity Management/Security features, Shipping Management, and the Moderation of the products, services and content published by its users. Shopit's free service is compatible on most social networks, blogs, and traditional ecommerce sites such as eBay, Craigslist, Yahoo Stores and Amazon. The service also supports communication with LinkedIn and Plaxo.”
So let's have a closer look:
What problem does Shopit solve?
Zooming and multitouch technology - some recent examples
Computers have boosted productivity in an unprecedented way, yet we currently lack one of the most critical functionalities in computers: Zooming!
Web3D is inevitable and we are on our way to Web3.D (with a dot)
Told you so! For a while I had the impression that I was among the last few of those who kept on dreaming about this stuff. Now Forrester claims that "During The Next Five To Seven Years, Web3D Will Evolve Quickly". Well, we have been told by James Wagner Au before why virtual worlds like Secondlife matter for businesses and we have heard the head of the Internet Paul Twomey say that the arrival of the 3D web is not a question about if but about when it will arrive.
A digital revenue model that makes sense - Getty & Flickr, iStockPhoto
I always listen up when I hear about revenue models that are built on digital products. And I always listen up when I hear about harnessing productivity of users by letting them participate in the success of their contribution. The business model of iStockPhoto has been impressive to me since the first time I saw the site - because it is a platform for digital products that presents users an option to make money online. Good money, serious money.
Recent comments
7 weeks 6 days ago
8 weeks 21 hours ago