Twitter

Twitter, Inc.Twitter 2010 logo.svg

Type   Private

Founded         San Francisco, California, U.S.

Founder(s)    Jack Dorsey, Noah Glass,

Evan Williams, Biz Stone

Headquarters            795 Folsom Street, Suite 600,

San Francisco, CA 94107, United States

Area served   Worldwide

Key people     Dick Costolo (CEO)

Jack Dorsey

(Executive Chairman)

Evan Williams (Director)

Biz Stone (Creative director)

Industry        Internet

Revenue         increase US$ 140 million (2010 est.)

Employees     600+ (2011)

Website          Twitter.com

Alexa rank     steady 9 (February 2012)

Type of site   Social network service, microblogging

Registration   Required (to post, follow or be followed)

Users  Over 300 million (June 2011)

Available in    Multilingual

Launched       July 15, 2006

Current status          Active

Twitter is an online social networking service and microblogging service that enables its users to send and read text-based posts of up to 140 characters, known as "tweets". It was created in March 2006 by Jack Dorsey and launched that July. The service rapidly gained worldwide popularity, with over 300 million users as of 2011, generating over 300 million tweets and handling over 1.6 billion search queries per day.It has been described as "the SMS of the Internet."

Twitter Inc. is based in San Francisco, with additional servers and offices in New York City.

History

CreationTwitter's origins lie in a "daylong brainstorming session" held by board members of the podcasting company Odeo. Dorsey introduced the idea of an individual using an SMS service to communicate with a small group.The original project code name for the service was twttr, an idea that Williams later ascribed to Noah Glass, inspired by Flickr and the five-character length of American SMS short codes. The developers initially considered "10958" as a short code, but later changed it to "40404" for "ease of use and memorability." Work on the project started on March 21, 2006, when Dorsey published the first Twitter message at 9:50 PM Pacific Standard Time (PST): "just setting up my twttr".

 

    "...we came across the word 'twitter', and it was just perfect. The definition was 'a short burst of inconsequential information,' and 'chirps from birds'. And that's exactly what the product was." – Jack Dorsey

 

The first Twitter prototype was used as an internal service for Odeo employees and the full version was introduced publicly on July 15, 2006. In October 2006, Biz Stone, Evan Williams, Dorsey, and other members of Odeo formed Obvious Corporation and acquired Odeo and all of its assets – including Odeo.com and Twitter.com – from the investors and shareholders. Williams fired Glass who was silent about his part in Twitter's startup until 2011.Twitter spun off into its own company in April 2007.

Reaction

The tipping point for Twitter's popularity was the 2007 South by Southwest (SXSW) festival. During the event, Twitter usage increased from 20,000 tweets per day to 60,000. "The Twitter people cleverly placed two 60-inch plasma screens in the conference hallways, exclusively streaming Twitter messages," remarked Newsweek's Steven Levy. "Hundreds of conference-goers kept tabs on each other via constant twitters. Panelists and speakers mentioned the service, and the bloggers in attendance touted it."

Reaction at the festival was highly positive. Blogger Scott Beale said that Twitter "absolutely rul[ed]" SXSW. Social software researcher Danah Boyd said Twitter "own[ed]" the festival. Twitter staff received the festival's Web Award prize with the remark "we'd like to thank you in 140 characters or less. And we just did!"

Previous Twitter logo, used until September 14, 2010.

The first unassisted off-Earth Twitter message was posted from the International Space Station by NASA astronaut T. J. Creamer on January 22, 2010.[23] By late November 2010, an average of a dozen updates per day were posted on the astronauts' communal account, @NASA_Astronauts. NASA has also hosted over 25 "tweetups", events that provide guests with VIP access to NASA facilities and speakers with the goal of leveraging participants' social networks to further the outreach goals of NASA.

In August 2010, the company appointed Adam Bain as President of Revenue from News Corp.'s Fox Audience Network.

On September 14, 2010, Twitter launched a redesigned site including a new logo.[citation needed]

Leadership

As chief executive officer, Dorsey saw the startup through two rounds of capital funding by the venture capitalists who backed the company.

On October 16, 2008,Williams took over the role of CEO, and Dorsey became chairman of the board.

On October 4, 2010, Williams announced that he was stepping down as CEO. Dick Costolo, formerly Twitter's chief operating officer, became CEO. According to a Twitter blog, dated October 4, 2010, Williams was to stay[dated info] with the company and "be completely focused on product strategy."[dated info]

According to The New York Times, "Mr. Dorsey and Mr. Costolo forged a close relationship" when Williams was away.[30] According to PC Magazine, Williams was "no longer involved in the day-to-day goings on at the company". He is focused on developing a new startup, but he became a member of Twitter's board of directors, and promised to "help in any way I can". Stone is still with Twitter but is working with AOL as an "advisor on volunteer efforts and philanthropy".

Dorsey rejoined Twitter in March 2011, as executive chairman focusing on product development. His time is split with Square (where he is CEO), whose offices are within walking distance of Twitter's in San Francisco.

In September 2011, Board Members and investors Fred Wilson and Bijan Sabet resigned from Twitter's Board of Directors.