Edward, I'm going to jump in on the partner issue, since that is my big point. I think you are thinking too small when you say " If you want to be a "partner" with Twitter, *you* are the one who needs to have something to offer *them* IMHO." One dev is very small compared to Twitter. 10,000 devs is a labor force. 100,000 devs is a market that protects Twitter from *any* competitor, including Google. We are all partners, because we all make money. You look old enough to remember dBASE. That was a huge labor force that protected Ashton-Tate for years when they had a product with technical limitations. Sound familiar? Corporations and government agencies used dBASE not because it was *best*, but because they could find many qualified developers. Ashton-Tate started attacking their developers in 1988, when they were one of the top 5 software companies. They were out of business 3 years later.
If Twitter wants to be embedded into the infrastructure of corporations around the world, they must have outside developers. If they want it to be a cool toy for the Kardashians and Justin Beiber to amuse their fans. They don't need us at all. It is their choice. On Sun, Feb 13, 2011 at 2:04 PM, M. Edward (Ed) Borasky <[email protected]> wrote: > On Sun, 13 Feb 2011 12:18:11 -0600, "Andrew W. Donoho" > <[email protected]> wrote: >> >> It is clear from this thread that many developers made, perhaps >> unwisely, product plans based on Twitter's continued support for white >> listing. In my case as a client developer, the increase of my API >> count from 150/hour to 350/hour due to moving to OAuth totally removed >> my need for white listing. If user streams was supported, I could >> easily live with 150/hour limit. If they would stand behind their user >> streams API, I would switch to it immediately. (Beta status is not, >> frankly, good enough. If they cannot make a commitment to their new >> API, why should I? By my count, user streams has been in beta for >> almost 6 months.) > > User Streams is in fact in production and has been for months. The only > restrictions on User Streams, other than what's documented in the technical > documentation, is that it is *only* for desktop *clients*, not servers or > mobile. I'm not sure where iPad fits in this spectrum, but for sure an > iPhone is mobile. > > *Site* Streams is designed for servers and it is still in beta. Perhaps you > need to be pitching your idea to Twitter and adapting your service to Site > Streams if it's a server-backed app, which I'm guessing an iPhone/iPad app > would be. > >> That said, Twitter's API evolution >> practices, presumably approved by their CTO, Mr. Sarver, are not, in >> my opinion, helping their partners grow with Twitter. > > [snip] > >> Another example is the closed roll-out of promoted tweets. I think >> every third party app developer would love to find a way to further >> monetize their Twitter application. Twitter did announce that they >> would find a way to allow their developer partners to participate with >> the promoted tweets program. That has not yet happened. Currently, as >> Twitter has made a floor price of $0.00 for iOS apps, I have to resort >> to Apple's iAds to capture revenue from my labors. I don't mind but it >> does cut my other market-making partner, Twitter, out of the revenue >> stream. As it reduces my revenue opportunities, I think this is >> sub-optimal. I win when my partner wins. > > The key word in this rant is "partner". A *partner* is, IMHO, someone who > has a *formal* partnership arrangement. Sure, there's a certain formality > when you accept Twitter's TOS, but I think if you want to use Site Streams > or Promoted content, you should be negotiating as a business with Twitter as > a business. What's in it for Twitter? > > Twitter has built a powerful brand. I was there in early 2007 when the vast > majority of pundits predicted that it would go nowhere - that it was just a > bunch of Ruby hackers with too much time on their hands, that it would > destroy flow, etc. It's now one of the top ten sites world wide according to > Alexa. If you want to be a "partner" with Twitter, *you* are the one who > needs to have something to offer *them* IMHO. > > [snip] > >> Overall, everyone needs to remember that we are dealing with a >> company that publicly claims to not yet be trying to capture revenue >> from their platform. > > I seem to have missed that claim. As far as I know, they *are* trying to > capture revenue through a combination of Promoted Accounts, Tweets and > Trends with bundled analytics and data licensing. > >> What do I want? I want a better developer experience. Both Apple and >> Microsoft show what a good experience can be. I want user streams, a >> promoted tweet API and annotations. I hope Twitter can deliver these >> technical features to enable new business opportunities for themselves >> and the Twitter app ecosystem. Myself included. > > I think you have User Streams, though it may not be suitable for your > specific application. You may be eligible to get in the Site Streams beta, > although I'm guessing that was invite-only. You can always ask - as a > business negotiating a partnership with another business. > > We'll have to wait and see about the Promoted products. Advertising sales is > a fiercely competitive business and it's not something I personally want to > deal with at the moment. > > Annotations? That was definitely a case where Twitter's reach seems to have > exceeded its grasp. The story I've heard is that there are people in Twitter > hacking away on it but the priorities do get adjusted according to the > demands of the marketplace. If it could be a breakthrough spam killer, I > think they'd push it front and center in a big hurry. ;-) > > -- > http://twitter.com/znmeb http://borasky-research.net > > "A mathematician is a device for turning coffee into theorems." -- Paul > Erdős > > -- > Twitter developer documentation and resources: http://dev.twitter.com/doc > API updates via Twitter: http://twitter.com/twitterapi > Issues/Enhancements Tracker: > http://code.google.com/p/twitter-api/issues/list > Change your membership to this group: > http://groups.google.com/group/twitter-development-talk > -- Adam Green Twitter API Consultant and Trainer http://140dev.com @140dev -- Twitter developer documentation and resources: http://dev.twitter.com/doc API updates via Twitter: http://twitter.com/twitterapi Issues/Enhancements Tracker: http://code.google.com/p/twitter-api/issues/list Change your membership to this group: http://groups.google.com/group/twitter-development-talk
