A tweet story

So I was probably one of the first 200 users of Twitter when it first came out. After two months, I tweeted, "I'm not sure where this thing is going and how useful it will be . . . ." and put my tweeting on hiatus for 4 years. OK, I was dead wrong! Now, Twitter appears to have taken front stage in the battle for your social networking attention. But usage levels are still debatable as twitter knock-offs try to advance the paradigm and the use of 140 characters to express a POV gets some people into serious trouble as noted by CNN's firing of a journalist over a seemingly benign tweet. It may not be relevant what position we take on the these side-effects of Twitter, but important to acknowledge there is a rising tide of potentially disruptive use cases for Twitter that will surely shift the game in certain situations. Much like FB, at some point the wisdom of crowds proves the value of a tool and we should expect to see some newsworthy applications of this technology in the near future.

Twitter's also a great example of VC startup's and why there's a need for different kinds of CEO's depending on the stage of the startup, interim CEO as they are frequently nicknamed. First Jack Dorsey, and now Evan Williams stepping aside after a two-year stint, we see the company preparing for the next big company creation phase shift. Dick Costolo hired a year ago as COO is taking the leadership position. Costolo was also an early investor in the company. Williams, who oversaw the web site's recent re-design, will remain at Twitter. But he will be focusing instead on product development. As CEO, Williams was able to grow the number of registered users from three million to 160 million. Now, the site is trying to make money off those users. Hence, the re-design, which allows Twitter to sell ads in a way that would not disrupt the flow of messages.

Here's a peek into the future of Twitter.

Here's a use of twitter in social activisim.

Here's how the law lags social media conventions