Can Twitter Evolve?

Over the past year, the new player on the internet is obviously Twitter.  Twitter’s growth has been nothing short of amazing.  The idea behind Twitter, as a micro-blogging service, has definitely found a need, and filled it amongst the internet community.  It all started with 4 simple words, What Are you Doing?  In essence, Twitter did something new.  They found a need, and filled it.

I can’t say that I was there in the beginning, nor did I take advantage of the site in it’s infancy.  However, over the past 6 months, my eyes have been opened as to how Twitter can effectively be used.  Spin off sites, and businesses have evolved such as Tweetdeck, Hootsuite, Twitpic, Twiends.com, and a new service called Followeet from a colleague of mine, Brad Gosse.  So the question remains, can Twitter evolve?

As an early user of facebook, I joined at the time where you still had to be a member of a university in order to create an account.  It was not yet available to the general public.  So, as an alumni, I was able to join with my university email address, and immediately was put into the network of other members of my community.  There was no chat, there were little or no applications such as Farmville, or Mafia Wars.  We were able to add friends, write on their wall, look at their pictures, create and join groups, and exchange comments.  Over the years, membership was made public, hundreds of apps were created, chat was added, facebook ads took off, and the list goes on.

As with all social media sites, a lot of time, resources, and capital must be put into creating a successful web 2.0 site.  However, over time, investors look for a return on their investment.  I don’t know where you were when the tech bubble burst, but there was a lot of talk about  a companies value, was only based on speculation.  These ridiculous dollar values were being put on companies, however, there was little to no revenue, yet to be produced.  Nobody was sure how they could monetize the ‘free’ internet.  Google got in the middle with Google AdWords, and sponsored links.  Facebook, started paid advertising.  The list goes on.

So, where does Twitter go?  If you follow any number of people, through your twitter account, Tweetdeck, tweetglide, etc, then you are already aware that it feels like one big revolving billboard.  How many hundreds of bit.ly or su.pr links go through your account each day?   So, it is only natural that paid advertising is the next step.  How would it work though?  Will I have to pay to send a bit.ly type link each time a tweet?  Do I really want to see 100’s of product ads accompanying each tweet?  Will each subscriber have ads on their homepage?  Will I have to view a paid advertisement to add or gain a follower?  I am sure we will find out soon.

Which leads me to the last question.  Can, or will, Twitter evolve?  What do you see they can add to their platform, that is not already there?   What service is missing, or can be intgrated into micro-blogging?  Let’s face it, It is impossible to have a genuine interest in 100, 1000, 10,000, let alone 100,000 people that you are following.  There is not enough time in a year to keep abreast.  It is physically impossible, and somewhat illogical.  Regardless, it happens everyday in the Twitter community.  So, for the time being, I will contiune to participate, develop my following, and take advantage of everything Twitter has to offer.  Who knows, maybe this is all it will ever be.

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