This week,
we look at the social networking service that everyone’s (still) taking
about…endlessly…
Twitter later spun off
into its own company in April 2007 with Jack as the CEO
At a glance
Founded:
2006
Founder:
Jack Dorsey, Noah Glass, Evan Williams, Biz Stone
Based in:
San Francisco
Known for:
Microblogging
Annual
turnover: $140 million
Staff: 600
Website: www.twitter.com
Twitter
seems ubiquitous now, but it’s still a relatively new company – one that grew
from one great idea. In early 2006, Twitter’s founders Evan Williams, Biz
Stone, Noah Glass, and Jack Dorsey were working for a company called Odeo,
which was working on launching a podcasting platform. But when that didn’t seem
to be taking off, a day’s brainstorming session led to a new idea.
Twitter tiptoes
further into the media business
Dorsey
pitched a service where small groups of friend could communicate via text
message, telling one another what they were doing and sending one another
recommendations. At the time, most people had fairly basic mobile phones, so
the service Dorsey had in mind would be simple – as simple as just sending a
normal text message. The idea clearly had potential, so Dorsey and co started
programming ‘twttr’, a name Noah Glass came up with. Within two weeks, a
functional Twitter prototype had been set up for Odeo employees to try out;
within three months, a version was available to the public.
Things
weren’t going so well for Odeo, though; Stone, Williams, Dorsey, and some other
Odeo employees left to form Obvious Corp, which then acquired Odeo’s assets,
including Twitter.com. For reasons clouded by history, Noah Glass left the
company in 2006. And in 2007, Twitter started to attract mainstream attention.
During the South by Southwest festival, Twitter streams were displayed on large
screens, and Twitter’s usage tripled. Suddenly, people started to see that
Twitter could be a means of communicating news, and connecting with people at
events, rather than just being a shorter version of blogging.
Twitter
became its own, distinct company after the festival. Over the next few years,
its userbase and usage grew exponentially, but many people weren’t convinced –
especially because, like so many startups, it wasn’t clear how Twitter would
ever manage to make money. In late 2009, Twitter signed deals with Microsoft
and Google that made its content searchable, but while many websites speculated
that the terms of those deals would make Twitter enough money for it to move
into the black, it’s not actually clear that that was the case. Some sources
suggest Twitter was still running at a loss throughout 2010. The company has
raised venture capital funding several times, including some $800 million
(around £505 million) in investment from Digital Sky Technology in 2010. It’s
been speculated that Twitter may go public next year, but again that’s just
speculation – and all the talk about the potentially billions of pounds the
service may be worth have yet to be borne out.
What we do
know for sure, though, is that Twitter has had an impact on the way the media
works. Most TV shows now start with their own hashtags, suggesting that viewers
tweet along while they’re watching; newspapers find stories (and celebrity
gossip) through Twitter. An unfortunately worded tweet led to one Twitter user,
Paul Chambers, being arrested – he’s still appealing against his conviction for
making a bomb threat. Twitter has become an indelible part of the media
landscape, a way of communicating with the outside world that’s particularly
valuable for those of us who work at home (believe me). 
