1
00:00:00,320 --> 00:00:03,000
Speaker 1: Brought to you by the reinvented two thousand twelve Camray.

2
00:00:03,200 --> 00:00:08,760
Speaker 1: It's ready. Are you get in touch with technology? With

3
00:00:08,920 --> 00:00:13,440
Speaker 1: tech stuff from how stuff Works dot com. Hey there,

4
00:00:13,520 --> 00:00:16,160
Speaker 1: and welcome to the podcast. This is Jonathan Strickland. I'm

5
00:00:16,200 --> 00:00:18,360
Speaker 1: a writer here and How Stuff Works and with me

6
00:00:18,520 --> 00:00:21,640
Speaker 1: is editor extraordinaire Chris Palette. Hi there, we got a

7
00:00:21,680 --> 00:00:25,759
Speaker 1: real tweet of a podcast for you. Dude. I'm sorry,

8
00:00:26,200 --> 00:00:30,120
Speaker 1: So we're talking about Twitter today. Yeah, we have an

9
00:00:30,160 --> 00:00:32,519
Speaker 1: article called how Twitter Works, but in a lot of

10
00:00:32,560 --> 00:00:36,520
Speaker 1: cases recently it's been sort of how Twitter doesn't work? Right?

11
00:00:36,880 --> 00:00:39,400
Speaker 1: There is there's a certain graphic that pops up when

12
00:00:39,400 --> 00:00:42,239
Speaker 1: Twitter is out of service. And I just got to

13
00:00:42,320 --> 00:00:44,480
Speaker 1: hear what the name of it was the other day, Chris,

14
00:00:44,520 --> 00:00:47,320
Speaker 1: come on share with us. It's the fail whale. Is

15
00:00:47,400 --> 00:00:50,680
Speaker 1: the fail whale. It's it's cheerful looking whale that tells

16
00:00:50,680 --> 00:00:55,120
Speaker 1: you that sorry, Twitter is not working just now. Um,

17
00:00:55,160 --> 00:00:57,640
Speaker 1: recently it's gotten a little bit better there. There haven't

18
00:00:57,640 --> 00:01:00,200
Speaker 1: been as many crashes, and we think that that might

19
00:01:00,240 --> 00:01:03,920
Speaker 1: have something to do with an a recent influx of

20
00:01:04,040 --> 00:01:07,760
Speaker 1: cash in the Twitter coffers. That's right. In May they

21
00:01:07,760 --> 00:01:12,520
Speaker 1: received fifteen million dollars in venture capital funding. Um, and

22
00:01:12,600 --> 00:01:15,720
Speaker 1: that increases there they're total to about twenty millions, so

23
00:01:15,760 --> 00:01:18,440
Speaker 1: that gives them a lot more capacity. And the reason

24
00:01:18,480 --> 00:01:20,680
Speaker 1: this is an issue is because people are starting to

25
00:01:20,760 --> 00:01:24,960
Speaker 1: take to these microblogs, which are basically a hundred and

26
00:01:25,360 --> 00:01:29,480
Speaker 1: sixty characters. Yeah. Yeah, and so basically you have to summarize,

27
00:01:29,640 --> 00:01:31,959
Speaker 1: you know, what you're saying in a very very short time.

28
00:01:32,040 --> 00:01:34,440
Speaker 1: And it gives people an opportunity to blurt out a

29
00:01:34,480 --> 00:01:37,319
Speaker 1: quick thought. Um. And it's very popular. It's taken off

30
00:01:37,319 --> 00:01:40,120
Speaker 1: so much that Twitter has been showing the fail whale

31
00:01:40,200 --> 00:01:42,000
Speaker 1: to many of us now right right, and and it

32
00:01:42,120 --> 00:01:47,760
Speaker 1: spans beyond just the internet. Uh. Twitter interfaces with cell phones.

33
00:01:47,960 --> 00:01:52,000
Speaker 1: It's using SMS technology, the short messaging service where you

34
00:01:52,000 --> 00:01:54,360
Speaker 1: you send these short messages. It's just like sending a

35
00:01:54,400 --> 00:01:57,000
Speaker 1: text message to someone else, except this case you're sending

36
00:01:57,000 --> 00:02:00,280
Speaker 1: a text message to a network of people. So when

37
00:02:00,320 --> 00:02:02,440
Speaker 1: a lot of people are sending lots of text messages

38
00:02:02,440 --> 00:02:04,840
Speaker 1: to large networks, that puts a lot of strain on

39
00:02:04,880 --> 00:02:09,040
Speaker 1: the system. But um, it's it's another important thing to

40
00:02:09,120 --> 00:02:12,480
Speaker 1: note that the venture capital that's going into Twitter is

41
00:02:12,520 --> 00:02:15,280
Speaker 1: really the main source. In fact, the really the only

42
00:02:15,360 --> 00:02:20,079
Speaker 1: source of significant revenue that Twitter is. It's not even

43
00:02:20,080 --> 00:02:22,960
Speaker 1: really generating revenue, it's just coming in on investments because

44
00:02:23,600 --> 00:02:26,440
Speaker 1: Twitter is very proud of the fact that they don't

45
00:02:26,520 --> 00:02:29,799
Speaker 1: have a business plan. Well, you know, there are a

46
00:02:29,840 --> 00:02:32,320
Speaker 1: lot of competitors out there that are taking advantage of

47
00:02:32,320 --> 00:02:36,840
Speaker 1: the frequent fail whales, like um um Pounds, which is

48
00:02:37,080 --> 00:02:40,720
Speaker 1: uh something created by a number of people, including one

49
00:02:40,720 --> 00:02:45,000
Speaker 1: of the founders of dig Kevin Rose right right, um Clerk,

50
00:02:45,160 --> 00:02:47,400
Speaker 1: which is created by a group of people call who

51
00:02:47,480 --> 00:02:51,280
Speaker 1: call themselves the A Team. Um Identica, which is a

52
00:02:51,280 --> 00:02:56,239
Speaker 1: brand new version from Canada which is completely open sourced.

53
00:02:56,880 --> 00:02:59,480
Speaker 1: Um you know, and I can't I can't figure out

54
00:02:59,520 --> 00:03:02,360
Speaker 1: whether the j is pronounced ji q or hi q.

55
00:03:02,720 --> 00:03:05,560
Speaker 1: But they were gobbled up by Google right getting ready

56
00:03:05,560 --> 00:03:07,400
Speaker 1: to run themselves in the Google App Engine, and they

57
00:03:07,400 --> 00:03:09,600
Speaker 1: haven't released their new version. But all these people are

58
00:03:09,600 --> 00:03:12,320
Speaker 1: sort of waiting in line to be the next Twitter

59
00:03:12,400 --> 00:03:16,760
Speaker 1: if Twitter manages to uh if they if they collapse

60
00:03:16,800 --> 00:03:19,240
Speaker 1: under the weight of all the popularity. And it's actually

61
00:03:19,240 --> 00:03:23,560
Speaker 1: interesting some of the some of the biggest Twitter cheerleaders

62
00:03:23,560 --> 00:03:27,560
Speaker 1: have kind of moved on to talking about other services

63
00:03:27,680 --> 00:03:30,680
Speaker 1: after seeing the fail whale one too many times. So

64
00:03:31,120 --> 00:03:33,959
Speaker 1: this is definitely a real concern for Twitter. Um it's

65
00:03:33,960 --> 00:03:37,440
Speaker 1: also showing us that that this microblog thing, it doesn't

66
00:03:37,480 --> 00:03:40,560
Speaker 1: look like it's going away. It's really really popular. And

67
00:03:40,600 --> 00:03:42,280
Speaker 1: it kind of surprised me because the first time I

68
00:03:42,320 --> 00:03:44,480
Speaker 1: thought about it was like, why would I want to

69
00:03:44,520 --> 00:03:47,000
Speaker 1: know when my friends going out to shop for new shoes?

70
00:03:47,680 --> 00:03:49,920
Speaker 1: But people are using it for lots of things, to

71
00:03:50,120 --> 00:03:53,400
Speaker 1: to organize impromptu gatherings like Hey, who wants to go

72
00:03:53,440 --> 00:03:56,680
Speaker 1: see a movie tonight? Or or even following the news.

73
00:03:56,720 --> 00:04:00,120
Speaker 1: There are many news organizations that have Twitter feeds now

74
00:04:00,520 --> 00:04:03,440
Speaker 1: and they give breaking news on you You hear about

75
00:04:03,480 --> 00:04:07,520
Speaker 1: breaking news before it hits any websites. Oh sure, Well,

76
00:04:07,560 --> 00:04:11,000
Speaker 1: I mean that gives you know, added venues for the

77
00:04:11,240 --> 00:04:14,640
Speaker 1: citizen journalists as they call them, to uh, you know,

78
00:04:14,760 --> 00:04:17,159
Speaker 1: to tweet there happened to be out on the on

79
00:04:17,200 --> 00:04:19,640
Speaker 1: the sidewalk while something happens, and someone can post it

80
00:04:19,680 --> 00:04:22,040
Speaker 1: to Twitter, and the news travels very quickly, faster than

81
00:04:22,080 --> 00:04:26,159
Speaker 1: the media outlets can broadcast it. At the speed of life.

82
00:04:26,320 --> 00:04:29,000
Speaker 1: You might say. As a matter of fact, I subscribe

83
00:04:29,080 --> 00:04:32,200
Speaker 1: on my Twitter account to a number of journalists and

84
00:04:32,360 --> 00:04:35,080
Speaker 1: photographers who happened to be out and when they see something,

85
00:04:35,120 --> 00:04:38,480
Speaker 1: they'll they'll post something to their Twitter and they can

86
00:04:38,560 --> 00:04:42,280
Speaker 1: even get you out of jail. Uh. James carl Buck

87
00:04:42,320 --> 00:04:46,400
Speaker 1: who was a grad student in Egypt, he got arrested

88
00:04:46,440 --> 00:04:50,800
Speaker 1: while photograph photographing an anti government demonstration. He tweet tweeted

89
00:04:50,960 --> 00:04:54,880
Speaker 1: the word arrested and sent it out to his followers,

90
00:04:55,040 --> 00:04:59,480
Speaker 1: and their response meant that he was freed shortly thereafter.

91
00:05:00,160 --> 00:05:03,839
Speaker 1: So it's definitely gots uses um for listeners out there

92
00:05:03,839 --> 00:05:06,880
Speaker 1: who are curious. I have a Twitter account. If you

93
00:05:06,920 --> 00:05:10,599
Speaker 1: want to follow me, it's Twitter dot com slash John

94
00:05:10,720 --> 00:05:13,320
Speaker 1: Strickland that's j O N S t R I c

95
00:05:13,560 --> 00:05:16,080
Speaker 1: K L A n D. And of course, if you

96
00:05:16,640 --> 00:05:19,880
Speaker 1: how stuff Works itself has a Twitter account. If you

97
00:05:19,960 --> 00:05:26,400
Speaker 1: follow how stuff Works underscore um, that's the official stuff

98
00:05:26,400 --> 00:05:29,320
Speaker 1: works Twitter. So I guess we'll have to tweet you

99
00:05:29,320 --> 00:05:31,680
Speaker 1: guys later in the meantime. If you want to learn more,

100
00:05:32,360 --> 00:05:35,000
Speaker 1: you can always read how Twitter Works at the website

101
00:05:35,040 --> 00:05:38,040
Speaker 1: how stuff works dot com. Thanks a lot for listening

102
00:05:39,760 --> 00:05:42,200
Speaker 1: for more on this and thousands of other topics. Does

103
00:05:42,200 --> 00:05:45,160
Speaker 1: it how stuff works dot com? Let us know what

104
00:05:45,200 --> 00:05:48,279
Speaker 1: you think. Send an email to podcast at how stuff

105
00:05:48,279 --> 00:05:54,400
Speaker 1: works dot com, Brought to you by the reinvented two

106
00:05:54,440 --> 00:05:57,000
Speaker 1: thousand twelve Camray. It's ready, Are you