1 00:00:04,240 --> 00:00:07,560 Speaker 1: Get in test with technology with Text Stuff from stuff 2 00:00:07,800 --> 00:00:15,040 Speaker 1: dot com. Hey everyone, and welcome to text Stuff. I'm 3 00:00:15,120 --> 00:00:19,480 Speaker 1: Jonathan Strickland, and and we're going to try and bring 4 00:00:19,520 --> 00:00:23,880 Speaker 1: you this podcast in characters are fewer. I don't think 5 00:00:23,880 --> 00:00:27,120 Speaker 1: that's an accurate description. But we are talking about Twitter today, Yes, 6 00:00:27,160 --> 00:00:30,120 Speaker 1: we are. In fact, anyone who knows me knows that 7 00:00:30,120 --> 00:00:34,280 Speaker 1: that would be impossible for me to express any thought 8 00:00:33,440 --> 00:00:36,680 Speaker 1: in characters or fewer. Well, you you do it pretty frequently. 9 00:00:36,680 --> 00:00:39,080 Speaker 1: I mean you're on Twitter. You have multiple Twitter accounts. Yes, 10 00:00:39,159 --> 00:00:41,159 Speaker 1: that's why I have to link like eight tweets in 11 00:00:41,159 --> 00:00:44,400 Speaker 1: a row for one thought. That's true. You do that thing, yeah, 12 00:00:44,520 --> 00:00:47,000 Speaker 1: do um. But anyway, yes, we're gonna talk about Twitter. 13 00:00:47,040 --> 00:00:49,040 Speaker 1: And for those of you who have been listening to 14 00:00:49,440 --> 00:00:51,760 Speaker 1: Text Stuff for years and years and years, you might say, 15 00:00:51,960 --> 00:00:54,720 Speaker 1: well hang on there. I seem to recall back in 16 00:00:54,760 --> 00:00:58,560 Speaker 1: the dark days, way back before you guys had any 17 00:00:58,560 --> 00:01:01,120 Speaker 1: idea of how you were doing podcasting, that you tried 18 00:01:01,160 --> 00:01:04,000 Speaker 1: to tackle Twitter before, and to you, I say, hey, 19 00:01:04,360 --> 00:01:08,400 Speaker 1: words can hurt. Twitter was the topic of the twelfth 20 00:01:08,480 --> 00:01:11,680 Speaker 1: ever episode of tech Stuff, way back on August four, 21 00:01:11,840 --> 00:01:17,520 Speaker 1: two thousan episode, and now we're up to almost six hundred. Ye. 22 00:01:17,959 --> 00:01:21,399 Speaker 1: But yeah, we talked in that episode about the technology 23 00:01:21,440 --> 00:01:24,479 Speaker 1: of Twitter, what what it actually was, and back then 24 00:01:24,480 --> 00:01:27,039 Speaker 1: it was in its still pretty young days, and we 25 00:01:27,080 --> 00:01:29,360 Speaker 1: thought now it would be fun to talk about the 26 00:01:29,400 --> 00:01:32,600 Speaker 1: actual story of the company itself. Right because in the 27 00:01:32,640 --> 00:01:36,120 Speaker 1: intervening time period, as of February, which is when we 28 00:01:36,160 --> 00:01:39,520 Speaker 1: are recording this podcast, Twitter has two hundred and forty 29 00:01:39,520 --> 00:01:43,280 Speaker 1: one million monthly active users who send some five hundred 30 00:01:43,319 --> 00:01:48,120 Speaker 1: million tweets per day. Yeah. That's uh, that's pretty heavy volume. 31 00:01:48,160 --> 00:01:50,360 Speaker 1: And if you had asked me back then when we 32 00:01:50,400 --> 00:01:52,600 Speaker 1: first did the Twitter podcast, if I thought that it 33 00:01:52,640 --> 00:01:55,040 Speaker 1: was ever going to get that big, I probably would 34 00:01:55,080 --> 00:01:57,680 Speaker 1: have laughed in your face because at that point I 35 00:01:57,720 --> 00:01:59,440 Speaker 1: had only been using Twitter for a little while. But 36 00:01:59,480 --> 00:02:01,720 Speaker 1: we'll get in to when we both started using Twitter 37 00:02:02,400 --> 00:02:04,160 Speaker 1: as we go through this podcast, and that that big. 38 00:02:04,200 --> 00:02:06,560 Speaker 1: And I do want to say also, that widespread because 39 00:02:06,600 --> 00:02:10,239 Speaker 1: only thirty three of Twitter's accounts are from the US. Yeah, 40 00:02:10,240 --> 00:02:12,240 Speaker 1: and that's a big deal. In fact, it's played a 41 00:02:12,320 --> 00:02:16,400 Speaker 1: huge role in some world shaping events actually, and we'll 42 00:02:16,440 --> 00:02:19,200 Speaker 1: talk about that too. Um, and might as well say, 43 00:02:19,240 --> 00:02:22,200 Speaker 1: this is gonna be two episodes because it's a long story, 44 00:02:22,360 --> 00:02:24,160 Speaker 1: so we doesn't want to do a like an epic 45 00:02:24,520 --> 00:02:27,240 Speaker 1: one and a half hour episode of tech stuff, so 46 00:02:27,360 --> 00:02:30,040 Speaker 1: we're going to split them up. But the other interesting 47 00:02:30,080 --> 00:02:33,120 Speaker 1: thing about Twitter and it's early days is that it's 48 00:02:33,160 --> 00:02:37,320 Speaker 1: actually kind of controversial. It's not just a simple story. 49 00:02:37,680 --> 00:02:40,519 Speaker 1: If you go and look at most of the uh 50 00:02:40,560 --> 00:02:43,200 Speaker 1: the accounts of the early days of Twitter, you hear 51 00:02:43,240 --> 00:02:46,960 Speaker 1: about three co founders, and that would be Jack Dorsey 52 00:02:47,280 --> 00:02:51,000 Speaker 1: or at Jack on Twitter, Evan Williams at e V 53 00:02:51,360 --> 00:02:54,880 Speaker 1: or at ev on Twitter, and Christopher biz Stone or 54 00:02:55,000 --> 00:02:58,760 Speaker 1: at biz on Twitter. So, uh that that's like the 55 00:02:58,800 --> 00:03:01,080 Speaker 1: official story is, those are the three people who co 56 00:03:01,280 --> 00:03:03,600 Speaker 1: founded Twitter. But if you look into it a little 57 00:03:03,600 --> 00:03:06,280 Speaker 1: more deeply, you'll see some other names pop up, other 58 00:03:06,320 --> 00:03:10,000 Speaker 1: people who were instrumental in the early days, including someone 59 00:03:10,120 --> 00:03:13,760 Speaker 1: named Noah Glass, who, according to at least some people, 60 00:03:13,800 --> 00:03:17,000 Speaker 1: should at least be considered another co founder. Um, and 61 00:03:17,040 --> 00:03:21,040 Speaker 1: we'll explain, you know, the whole controversy behind that story too. 62 00:03:21,040 --> 00:03:24,080 Speaker 1: It's pretty interesting stuff. Uh. This was all stuff that 63 00:03:24,160 --> 00:03:26,160 Speaker 1: I was completely unaware of back when I did the 64 00:03:26,200 --> 00:03:28,959 Speaker 1: first episode of Twitter, because none of a lot of 65 00:03:29,000 --> 00:03:31,919 Speaker 1: people were talking about the actual early days. In fact, 66 00:03:31,960 --> 00:03:33,639 Speaker 1: a lot of people were skeptical that this thing was 67 00:03:33,680 --> 00:03:35,960 Speaker 1: going to stick around for very long. Sure it wasn't 68 00:03:36,000 --> 00:03:38,040 Speaker 1: so big yet that people had started to really do 69 00:03:38,160 --> 00:03:42,080 Speaker 1: these sort of interesting inner looks and mini biographies and 70 00:03:42,120 --> 00:03:44,760 Speaker 1: stuff like yeah, yeah, Well, it hadn't been around long 71 00:03:44,840 --> 00:03:46,600 Speaker 1: enough for it to really accrue much of a story 72 00:03:46,680 --> 00:03:48,920 Speaker 1: at that point, unless you had been at south By 73 00:03:48,920 --> 00:03:51,520 Speaker 1: Southwest and then thought that it was the most amazing 74 00:03:51,560 --> 00:03:54,440 Speaker 1: thing in the world. So the story of Twitter actually 75 00:03:54,520 --> 00:03:59,520 Speaker 1: begins with a different company called Odio, and Odio was 76 00:03:59,560 --> 00:04:03,240 Speaker 1: a company that was looking into creating a platform for podcasting, 77 00:04:03,560 --> 00:04:05,800 Speaker 1: and it was kind of similar in a way to Twitter, 78 00:04:05,880 --> 00:04:07,600 Speaker 1: because in the early days of Twitter, it was very 79 00:04:07,640 --> 00:04:11,440 Speaker 1: much focused on using your phone to send out messages. 80 00:04:12,000 --> 00:04:15,320 Speaker 1: Uh Odeo was looking at creating a product that was 81 00:04:15,400 --> 00:04:19,400 Speaker 1: more about allowing you to create a voicemail message that 82 00:04:19,440 --> 00:04:22,480 Speaker 1: would then be converted into an MP three file and 83 00:04:22,560 --> 00:04:25,839 Speaker 1: hosted on the web, so you could create a podcast 84 00:04:25,880 --> 00:04:27,839 Speaker 1: that way if you wanted to. You could actually dial 85 00:04:27,880 --> 00:04:31,000 Speaker 1: into this and create a long message that then would 86 00:04:31,000 --> 00:04:34,000 Speaker 1: be converted into an MP three and hosted. And they thought, well, 87 00:04:34,040 --> 00:04:36,960 Speaker 1: this is a great way of getting giving people the 88 00:04:37,000 --> 00:04:40,200 Speaker 1: power of broadcasting. They can actually sit down and do 89 00:04:40,279 --> 00:04:42,320 Speaker 1: exactly what Lauren and I are doing right now. We're 90 00:04:42,320 --> 00:04:45,000 Speaker 1: talking into a microphone and we're having it recorded. Then 91 00:04:45,000 --> 00:04:48,479 Speaker 1: we can broadcast it out and uh. There were some 92 00:04:48,520 --> 00:04:51,560 Speaker 1: problems in those early days with this product. One was 93 00:04:51,600 --> 00:04:55,039 Speaker 1: that it launched in two thousand five, just a little 94 00:04:55,040 --> 00:05:00,920 Speaker 1: bit before another big podcasting product launched, just iTunes. Yeah, 95 00:05:01,040 --> 00:05:05,000 Speaker 1: iTunes the the platform that defined podcasting in those early days. 96 00:05:05,400 --> 00:05:08,520 Speaker 1: Now these days, you can obviously get podcasts through lots 97 00:05:08,560 --> 00:05:12,600 Speaker 1: of different programs, lots of different podcast catchers, but iTunes 98 00:05:12,680 --> 00:05:15,400 Speaker 1: for a very long time was pretty much the only 99 00:05:15,440 --> 00:05:18,280 Speaker 1: game in town because so many people subscribe to it 100 00:05:18,680 --> 00:05:21,400 Speaker 1: that everything else was like a teeny tiny slice of 101 00:05:21,400 --> 00:05:26,000 Speaker 1: the pie. And beyond that, the other story was that 102 00:05:26,160 --> 00:05:29,120 Speaker 1: all these people at Odeo were saying, you know, we 103 00:05:29,160 --> 00:05:32,080 Speaker 1: work really hard on this product all the time, but 104 00:05:32,160 --> 00:05:36,920 Speaker 1: none of us are using it. Bad sign So if 105 00:05:37,000 --> 00:05:39,120 Speaker 1: you are not, If you are an engineer and you're 106 00:05:39,120 --> 00:05:41,520 Speaker 1: working on a product you know and you're not using it, 107 00:05:41,600 --> 00:05:45,200 Speaker 1: that's what Google calls dog fooding, where the people over 108 00:05:45,240 --> 00:05:48,400 Speaker 1: at Google use the products that they're working on. Um, 109 00:05:48,440 --> 00:05:50,839 Speaker 1: if if no one's doing that, that's a bad sign 110 00:05:50,839 --> 00:05:53,640 Speaker 1: and suggest that perhaps you won't be able to find 111 00:05:53,720 --> 00:05:57,880 Speaker 1: customers either. So while all this is going on, I mean, 112 00:05:57,920 --> 00:06:01,440 Speaker 1: it was clearly a stressful time at Odeo. There were 113 00:06:01,480 --> 00:06:05,080 Speaker 1: some other people who had ideas for potential other uses 114 00:06:05,240 --> 00:06:10,800 Speaker 1: of SMS technology, that short messaging service technology, including a 115 00:06:11,000 --> 00:06:14,200 Speaker 1: Mr Jack Dorsey. As I recall, yeah, all of all 116 00:06:14,200 --> 00:06:15,640 Speaker 1: of the people that we mentioned at the top of 117 00:06:15,640 --> 00:06:19,599 Speaker 1: the show as being these these founders or controversial founders 118 00:06:19,600 --> 00:06:22,719 Speaker 1: of Twitter were involved with Odeo at the time. Yes, yeah, 119 00:06:22,760 --> 00:06:25,760 Speaker 1: In fact, some of them actually had come over from Google. Uh. 120 00:06:25,839 --> 00:06:28,880 Speaker 1: Evan Williams was the founder of a little program called 121 00:06:28,960 --> 00:06:31,480 Speaker 1: or a little service called Blogger, which got acquired by 122 00:06:31,480 --> 00:06:35,960 Speaker 1: Google made him a multi millionaire. He then left Google 123 00:06:36,040 --> 00:06:38,359 Speaker 1: to be one of the co founders of Odeo and 124 00:06:38,400 --> 00:06:42,120 Speaker 1: the CEO I believe, Yeah, and Biz also was with 125 00:06:42,200 --> 00:06:45,799 Speaker 1: Google before Odeo. And Jack Dorsey was a web developer, 126 00:06:46,279 --> 00:06:49,080 Speaker 1: and so Mr Noah Glass was the one who had 127 00:06:49,120 --> 00:06:53,400 Speaker 1: come up with this technology that that created that platform, Yeah, exactly. 128 00:06:53,440 --> 00:06:56,760 Speaker 1: And so Dorsey had this other idea, and he had 129 00:06:56,760 --> 00:06:59,360 Speaker 1: been kicking it around for a while. Actually, he had 130 00:06:59,360 --> 00:07:03,200 Speaker 1: this idea of allowing people to share just a really 131 00:07:03,279 --> 00:07:06,200 Speaker 1: brief status update, just kind of like what's going on 132 00:07:06,279 --> 00:07:09,080 Speaker 1: with their life. At that very moment, Twitter was almost 133 00:07:09,360 --> 00:07:13,160 Speaker 1: called status that's s T A T dot us in fact, 134 00:07:13,280 --> 00:07:15,200 Speaker 1: and Dorsey has talked about how fond he is of 135 00:07:15,280 --> 00:07:19,040 Speaker 1: those kind of little kitchy web naming Yeah, where you 136 00:07:19,040 --> 00:07:21,360 Speaker 1: can where you can make the the top level domain 137 00:07:21,480 --> 00:07:25,120 Speaker 1: be the completion of whatever your product um But he 138 00:07:25,120 --> 00:07:26,600 Speaker 1: he says that he had first come up with the 139 00:07:26,640 --> 00:07:29,200 Speaker 1: idea way back in July of two thousand, just a 140 00:07:29,240 --> 00:07:31,800 Speaker 1: couple of months into his use of live journal, which 141 00:07:31,840 --> 00:07:37,080 Speaker 1: was a pretty new thing at the time. His concept 142 00:07:37,200 --> 00:07:39,400 Speaker 1: was to make a and I quote a more live 143 00:07:39,600 --> 00:07:42,000 Speaker 1: live journal, real time up to date from the road, 144 00:07:42,200 --> 00:07:44,600 Speaker 1: akin to updating your A I M. Status from wherever 145 00:07:44,680 --> 00:07:48,520 Speaker 1: you are and sharing it. So he was looking into like, 146 00:07:48,880 --> 00:07:50,600 Speaker 1: this is a great idea. I know, this is a 147 00:07:50,640 --> 00:07:52,960 Speaker 1: great idea. This is going to resonate with people. People 148 00:07:53,000 --> 00:07:55,760 Speaker 1: are going to be addicted to this. I just don't 149 00:07:55,880 --> 00:07:58,560 Speaker 1: know where to put it. I have no idea where. Yeah, 150 00:07:58,600 --> 00:08:01,200 Speaker 1: he toyed with implementing it in a whole bunch of 151 00:08:01,240 --> 00:08:03,800 Speaker 1: different bits of software that he was working on, and 152 00:08:03,880 --> 00:08:06,360 Speaker 1: his cohorts at Odeo were working on and it just 153 00:08:06,440 --> 00:08:09,280 Speaker 1: kind of didn't take off for six years. Yeah, he 154 00:08:09,440 --> 00:08:12,600 Speaker 1: eventually was able to talk to Noah Glass and explain 155 00:08:12,680 --> 00:08:15,720 Speaker 1: the idea in a way that Glass was able to 156 00:08:15,720 --> 00:08:18,760 Speaker 1: to latch onto it. In fact, if you read interviews 157 00:08:18,840 --> 00:08:21,720 Speaker 1: with Glass and with Dorsey, uh, they talk about how 158 00:08:22,040 --> 00:08:24,280 Speaker 1: it was this kind of crazy take the guy out 159 00:08:24,280 --> 00:08:26,760 Speaker 1: to lunch and explain it. And then yeah, but why 160 00:08:26,760 --> 00:08:29,200 Speaker 1: would anyone want to do that? No, no, no, no no, seriously, 161 00:08:29,200 --> 00:08:31,520 Speaker 1: people are gonna want to do them. Yeah, but but 162 00:08:31,560 --> 00:08:33,160 Speaker 1: why are people going to want to do that? And 163 00:08:33,200 --> 00:08:36,800 Speaker 1: eventually Glass saw the light, you know, something switched on 164 00:08:36,840 --> 00:08:39,520 Speaker 1: in his mind. He said, yeah, this is we could 165 00:08:39,559 --> 00:08:42,520 Speaker 1: totally implement this. We could create a system where you 166 00:08:42,559 --> 00:08:45,240 Speaker 1: could broadcast out a message to a network of people 167 00:08:45,240 --> 00:08:48,520 Speaker 1: who follow you. Why don't we do that? And so um, 168 00:08:48,600 --> 00:08:51,400 Speaker 1: Glass ended up kind of becoming the chief evangelist of 169 00:08:51,440 --> 00:08:54,080 Speaker 1: this idea, this product idea, which still was not an 170 00:08:54,120 --> 00:08:58,760 Speaker 1: official thing with Odeo. So they decide Dorsey and Glass 171 00:08:58,840 --> 00:09:02,360 Speaker 1: along with a third fellow named Florian Webber, to present 172 00:09:02,480 --> 00:09:06,360 Speaker 1: this idea to the business owners at Odeo. So Evan 173 00:09:06,400 --> 00:09:08,719 Speaker 1: Williams and Biz Stone and kind of say, look, this 174 00:09:08,800 --> 00:09:12,040 Speaker 1: is an idea we have for a different kind of product. 175 00:09:12,880 --> 00:09:15,199 Speaker 1: We think that there's a lot of potential here. Our 176 00:09:15,320 --> 00:09:18,679 Speaker 1: podcast platform doesn't seem to really be going anywhere. Why 177 00:09:18,720 --> 00:09:22,200 Speaker 1: don't we do this because otherwise was our company gonna do? Right? 178 00:09:22,280 --> 00:09:25,000 Speaker 1: And that was in February of two thousand six, and 179 00:09:25,080 --> 00:09:27,960 Speaker 1: the product that they were that they were recommending was 180 00:09:28,000 --> 00:09:32,720 Speaker 1: specifically called Twitter and that is spelled t W T 181 00:09:32,720 --> 00:09:37,240 Speaker 1: t R. Yeah. Yeah, because every single character space is valuable, 182 00:09:37,240 --> 00:09:40,400 Speaker 1: So get rid of those vowels. You know. Actually, I've 183 00:09:40,400 --> 00:09:43,320 Speaker 1: actually seen some tweets that are written in the style 184 00:09:43,400 --> 00:09:46,600 Speaker 1: as if they were all following that philosophy, just dropping 185 00:09:46,640 --> 00:09:49,920 Speaker 1: all the vowels. It's it's frightening how well you can 186 00:09:50,040 --> 00:09:53,400 Speaker 1: start to read those once you practice a little bit. Yeah, 187 00:09:53,600 --> 00:09:55,680 Speaker 1: the human brain is terrific, Like, so don't understand that 188 00:09:55,720 --> 00:09:59,280 Speaker 1: text speak that the kids are all crazy about. Yeah, lulls. 189 00:09:59,720 --> 00:10:03,520 Speaker 1: So anyway, Yeah, February two thousand six, this idea gets 190 00:10:03,520 --> 00:10:06,560 Speaker 1: a little bit of traction. And while the response was 191 00:10:06,600 --> 00:10:09,200 Speaker 1: not immediately this is what we're going to do from 192 00:10:09,200 --> 00:10:13,240 Speaker 1: here on out, essentially, Glass and Dorsey and Webber got 193 00:10:13,280 --> 00:10:17,400 Speaker 1: the go ahead to start working on this product, and 194 00:10:17,480 --> 00:10:20,040 Speaker 1: so they did and they began to launch it very 195 00:10:20,160 --> 00:10:24,000 Speaker 1: gradually once they started building the actual UH technology out. 196 00:10:24,040 --> 00:10:27,480 Speaker 1: In fact, Glass says that for a while he was 197 00:10:27,559 --> 00:10:30,720 Speaker 1: running the entire service of Twitter off of his laptop, 198 00:10:31,000 --> 00:10:34,160 Speaker 1: like it wasn't a server. It lived on his laptop, 199 00:10:34,160 --> 00:10:35,760 Speaker 1: and his laptop had to be on and plugged in 200 00:10:35,800 --> 00:10:39,520 Speaker 1: and everything and everything was funneled through there. And if 201 00:10:39,520 --> 00:10:42,600 Speaker 1: you're not really familiar with especially the early days of Twitter, 202 00:10:43,240 --> 00:10:45,679 Speaker 1: keep in mind we're talking two thousand six, that's before 203 00:10:45,760 --> 00:10:49,079 Speaker 1: the iPhone comes out, so this is before smartphones. We're 204 00:10:49,080 --> 00:10:52,199 Speaker 1: not talking about an app that allows you to UH 205 00:10:52,240 --> 00:10:57,400 Speaker 1: to look at Twitter and follow back on that SMS exactly, 206 00:10:57,440 --> 00:10:59,640 Speaker 1: just text messages, the same source stuff you would use 207 00:10:59,640 --> 00:11:02,600 Speaker 1: if you were to text a friend. So you could 208 00:11:02,640 --> 00:11:06,800 Speaker 1: either dial in a a special number and send a 209 00:11:06,880 --> 00:11:09,079 Speaker 1: text to that number and then it would just broadcast 210 00:11:09,080 --> 00:11:11,120 Speaker 1: out to all of the people who follow you on Twitter, 211 00:11:11,640 --> 00:11:14,000 Speaker 1: or you could post on the web client. You could 212 00:11:14,040 --> 00:11:16,800 Speaker 1: go to a web page, which you know people still 213 00:11:16,840 --> 00:11:19,000 Speaker 1: do occasionally, they'll still go to the Twitter web page 214 00:11:19,040 --> 00:11:22,120 Speaker 1: and type stuff in online on their desktop, But there 215 00:11:22,240 --> 00:11:25,360 Speaker 1: wasn't any kind of smartphone app interface at this point, 216 00:11:25,440 --> 00:11:28,960 Speaker 1: so it was really early days. So Glass was put 217 00:11:29,000 --> 00:11:34,000 Speaker 1: in charge of this project and they kind of worked 218 00:11:34,520 --> 00:11:37,400 Speaker 1: on this for a while until about March twenty one, 219 00:11:37,520 --> 00:11:40,240 Speaker 1: two thousand and six, when the service was actually ready 220 00:11:40,600 --> 00:11:43,559 Speaker 1: to support a tweet, and that's when the very first 221 00:11:43,600 --> 00:11:47,040 Speaker 1: tweet was written. It was sent by by Jack at 222 00:11:47,120 --> 00:11:50,079 Speaker 1: Jack Dorsey and uh, and here it is, guys. I mean, 223 00:11:50,120 --> 00:11:55,360 Speaker 1: if you this rivals the first video on YouTube for 224 00:11:55,640 --> 00:12:00,560 Speaker 1: like colossal importance, Jack's first Twitter was just setting up 225 00:12:00,559 --> 00:12:04,480 Speaker 1: my Twitter. That's Twitter, t W T t R. You know, 226 00:12:04,600 --> 00:12:07,040 Speaker 1: like we said earlier, there's a period in there too. 227 00:12:07,040 --> 00:12:09,440 Speaker 1: Oh yes, yeah he did. He did use the character 228 00:12:09,559 --> 00:12:13,319 Speaker 1: of a period as well. So um yeah, so if 229 00:12:13,360 --> 00:12:15,559 Speaker 1: you when I made that YouTube joke, that's for anyone 230 00:12:15,559 --> 00:12:18,040 Speaker 1: who remembers that the very first video ever uploaded the 231 00:12:18,080 --> 00:12:21,280 Speaker 1: YouTube was a Day at the Zoo. Was one of 232 00:12:21,320 --> 00:12:24,320 Speaker 1: the YouTube founders taking a video at a local zoo 233 00:12:24,320 --> 00:12:27,760 Speaker 1: and then uploading it. So yeah, sometimes these these things 234 00:12:27,800 --> 00:12:33,080 Speaker 1: that end up having world changing uh reach, start off 235 00:12:33,200 --> 00:12:37,400 Speaker 1: kind of modest of the bang. But that's but that's 236 00:12:37,400 --> 00:12:40,600 Speaker 1: okay too. And uh, in case you're wondering, like what 237 00:12:40,679 --> 00:12:43,160 Speaker 1: else is going on around this same time that Twitter 238 00:12:43,320 --> 00:12:47,560 Speaker 1: first starts to to to be active. Facebook at that 239 00:12:47,640 --> 00:12:51,640 Speaker 1: time had just earlier that year set up their public 240 00:12:52,360 --> 00:12:54,840 Speaker 1: uh entry into Facebook. In other words, you didn't have 241 00:12:54,880 --> 00:12:57,360 Speaker 1: to be a college student to get into Facebook. At 242 00:12:57,400 --> 00:12:59,360 Speaker 1: that time. They first started opening it up to a 243 00:12:59,400 --> 00:13:02,520 Speaker 1: few of a companies that so, if you're if your 244 00:13:02,559 --> 00:13:06,160 Speaker 1: email address had a certain type of private company addressing it, 245 00:13:06,480 --> 00:13:08,560 Speaker 1: you could join. And then eventually they opened it up 246 00:13:08,640 --> 00:13:11,160 Speaker 1: to the general public. Yeah. Well, well in April of 247 00:13:11,200 --> 00:13:14,160 Speaker 1: two thousand six, right, they started opening up that registration 248 00:13:15,320 --> 00:13:18,840 Speaker 1: just a month or so after, You're right after, not before. 249 00:13:18,880 --> 00:13:22,240 Speaker 1: Thank you, Lauren for keeping us honest. But yes, so 250 00:13:22,760 --> 00:13:25,560 Speaker 1: this is early days in the social networking world. Now. Granted, 251 00:13:25,559 --> 00:13:28,520 Speaker 1: even in those early days, Facebook still had a pretty 252 00:13:28,559 --> 00:13:31,080 Speaker 1: decent headstart, because yeah, it's not like they were new 253 00:13:31,120 --> 00:13:33,120 Speaker 1: at that point at all. Yeah, they had had a 254 00:13:33,160 --> 00:13:36,040 Speaker 1: lot of colleges involved in that program, and at that 255 00:13:36,080 --> 00:13:40,120 Speaker 1: point they had something like six million users. Twitter, after 256 00:13:40,160 --> 00:13:42,679 Speaker 1: a few months of it being live, had fewer than 257 00:13:42,800 --> 00:13:48,040 Speaker 1: five thousand users. So big big gap there, you can, 258 00:13:48,200 --> 00:13:51,240 Speaker 1: you could say, although people were interested in it. In 259 00:13:51,320 --> 00:13:54,840 Speaker 1: July two six, there was a really interesting coverage of 260 00:13:54,880 --> 00:13:58,560 Speaker 1: Twitter from tech Crunch something. Yeah, Michael Arrington wrote about it, 261 00:13:58,600 --> 00:14:01,960 Speaker 1: and uh, in the the article they talked about it 262 00:14:02,000 --> 00:14:05,679 Speaker 1: being a group send SMS service. So again this idea 263 00:14:05,720 --> 00:14:08,840 Speaker 1: of being able to broadcast out the message to your friends. Now, 264 00:14:08,880 --> 00:14:10,560 Speaker 1: this is kind of interesting because if you think of 265 00:14:10,559 --> 00:14:13,200 Speaker 1: what Twitter has become, it's a little bit different from 266 00:14:13,200 --> 00:14:16,440 Speaker 1: what was how it was first envisioned. Like back in 267 00:14:16,480 --> 00:14:19,040 Speaker 1: the day, it might have been something like, you want 268 00:14:19,120 --> 00:14:21,800 Speaker 1: to hold a party on the weekend, and you're like, 269 00:14:22,000 --> 00:14:24,400 Speaker 1: who wants to go to the pizza party thing? I 270 00:14:24,440 --> 00:14:26,520 Speaker 1: want to throw and you just send it out to everybody. 271 00:14:26,560 --> 00:14:29,120 Speaker 1: In that way, you don't have to individually send out 272 00:14:29,360 --> 00:14:33,920 Speaker 1: text messages to everyone. And that's really how everyone was 273 00:14:33,960 --> 00:14:36,360 Speaker 1: billing Twitter as being. You know, this is this is 274 00:14:36,360 --> 00:14:38,560 Speaker 1: the way that Twitter should be used. It totally makes sense, 275 00:14:38,960 --> 00:14:41,880 Speaker 1: but it's interesting because the way people actually use Twitter 276 00:14:41,960 --> 00:14:44,680 Speaker 1: would end up being very different from that. Uh and 277 00:14:44,920 --> 00:14:47,360 Speaker 1: in various ways. I mean, a lot of people like 278 00:14:47,480 --> 00:14:50,720 Speaker 1: to tell you what they're eating still to this day. 279 00:14:50,760 --> 00:14:52,840 Speaker 1: That was a big joke on Twitter for a long time, 280 00:14:52,880 --> 00:14:56,120 Speaker 1: but it's I did it recently, took a picture of 281 00:14:56,160 --> 00:14:59,760 Speaker 1: a delicious omelet idia and I had to send it out. 282 00:15:00,200 --> 00:15:03,280 Speaker 1: But um, yeah, so and then of course we're using 283 00:15:03,280 --> 00:15:05,440 Speaker 1: it now for news, and we're using it to uh 284 00:15:05,440 --> 00:15:09,360 Speaker 1: to follow celebrities or even interact with people that we 285 00:15:09,440 --> 00:15:13,040 Speaker 1: admire when you never would have had that that conduit 286 00:15:13,160 --> 00:15:15,560 Speaker 1: open before, or if you're just up to the minute 287 00:15:15,640 --> 00:15:18,280 Speaker 1: um networking with with all kinds of people who you 288 00:15:18,680 --> 00:15:21,400 Speaker 1: might have never had a chance to talk to. Oh yeah, 289 00:15:21,440 --> 00:15:25,480 Speaker 1: I've I've actually been contacted via Twitter to do cool 290 00:15:25,560 --> 00:15:28,080 Speaker 1: stuff like to to do a guest appearance on a show, 291 00:15:28,320 --> 00:15:31,680 Speaker 1: or to have people give me interesting ideas for shows 292 00:15:31,680 --> 00:15:35,520 Speaker 1: that we do. So it's definitely evolved. But what's interesting 293 00:15:35,560 --> 00:15:39,720 Speaker 1: is that none of that was really at that point. 294 00:15:40,040 --> 00:15:42,920 Speaker 1: Even Mike Arrington, who is, depending upon your point of view, 295 00:15:43,360 --> 00:15:47,280 Speaker 1: really good at predicting what's going to work in technology. Uh, 296 00:15:47,720 --> 00:15:50,280 Speaker 1: he didn't really touch on that in his article at all. 297 00:15:50,600 --> 00:15:53,520 Speaker 1: He actually did compare Twitter to another service that was 298 00:15:53,560 --> 00:15:56,600 Speaker 1: called Dodgeball. Now that I think is a little weird 299 00:15:56,640 --> 00:15:59,440 Speaker 1: because Dodgeball was more of a location based service and 300 00:15:59,520 --> 00:16:03,000 Speaker 1: less of a broadcast a message out service, and Dodgeball 301 00:16:03,040 --> 00:16:07,120 Speaker 1: would eventually be acquired by Google. Right. Um it was 302 00:16:07,120 --> 00:16:09,480 Speaker 1: it was similar in the way that people were using 303 00:16:09,480 --> 00:16:13,640 Speaker 1: it for, uh, for a quick, unobtrusive way to get 304 00:16:13,680 --> 00:16:17,600 Speaker 1: in touch with people about something small. Yeah, it's it's 305 00:16:17,640 --> 00:16:19,640 Speaker 1: related in the same way that you could say like 306 00:16:19,680 --> 00:16:23,320 Speaker 1: MySpace and Facebook were related and that they did similar things, 307 00:16:23,320 --> 00:16:25,920 Speaker 1: but they had very different approaches. In fact, maybe even 308 00:16:25,960 --> 00:16:29,680 Speaker 1: more different than my Space and Facebook were. But those founders, 309 00:16:29,720 --> 00:16:32,160 Speaker 1: after Google bought them out, would go on to create 310 00:16:32,240 --> 00:16:36,320 Speaker 1: four Square. All of them left Google. They I hear 311 00:16:36,360 --> 00:16:38,880 Speaker 1: a very similar story from the folks who used to 312 00:16:38,880 --> 00:16:41,160 Speaker 1: be a blogger and the folks who used to be 313 00:16:41,200 --> 00:16:45,400 Speaker 1: with Dodgeball in that once Google acquired the company, satisfaction 314 00:16:45,520 --> 00:16:48,360 Speaker 1: kind of dropped out. They just it wasn't a good culture, 315 00:16:49,120 --> 00:16:52,000 Speaker 1: it wasn't a mixed Yeah. So they ended up leaving 316 00:16:52,000 --> 00:16:55,200 Speaker 1: and founding four Square, which by the way worked out 317 00:16:55,240 --> 00:16:58,800 Speaker 1: for them. Um. And then there was another similar service 318 00:16:58,840 --> 00:17:01,800 Speaker 1: And anyone who was around in the early days of 319 00:17:01,800 --> 00:17:05,680 Speaker 1: Twitter probably has heard of this called Jaiku. It's supposed 320 00:17:05,680 --> 00:17:08,640 Speaker 1: to be the combination of the words Japanese and haiku. 321 00:17:09,119 --> 00:17:12,320 Speaker 1: It was founded by a couple of Finnish developers, as 322 00:17:12,320 --> 00:17:15,960 Speaker 1: in from Finland. Not that they were done, they weren't 323 00:17:16,040 --> 00:17:20,480 Speaker 1: finished developers, they were Finnished. I'm just trying to explain. 324 00:17:20,560 --> 00:17:23,520 Speaker 1: Lauren just In case people misunderstand me. Um, but yeah, 325 00:17:23,560 --> 00:17:25,800 Speaker 1: it used a very similar approach. I mean it was 326 00:17:25,880 --> 00:17:30,960 Speaker 1: essentially a a almost identical service, and I actually used 327 00:17:31,000 --> 00:17:35,080 Speaker 1: both for a while. Jaiku also would eventually get shuttered. 328 00:17:35,080 --> 00:17:37,480 Speaker 1: It would not it would not stand the test of time. 329 00:17:37,480 --> 00:17:39,719 Speaker 1: It was just that too many people were using Twitter 330 00:17:40,080 --> 00:17:42,840 Speaker 1: and not enough people were using Jaiku, and while the 331 00:17:43,280 --> 00:17:46,320 Speaker 1: services were very similar, there wasn't any real reason to 332 00:17:46,440 --> 00:17:51,439 Speaker 1: use both, Like, especially at the limited range that Twitter 333 00:17:51,520 --> 00:17:53,640 Speaker 1: was operating at the time, it was really only being 334 00:17:53,680 --> 00:17:56,680 Speaker 1: populated by um kind of kind of high level, well 335 00:17:56,680 --> 00:18:00,520 Speaker 1: connected Silicon Valley sort of types. Yeah, if if you 336 00:18:00,560 --> 00:18:03,320 Speaker 1: were around in the very early days of Google Plus, 337 00:18:03,440 --> 00:18:06,520 Speaker 1: very similar Like I remember I got invited into the 338 00:18:06,520 --> 00:18:10,160 Speaker 1: Google Plus beta like within the first week or two 339 00:18:10,240 --> 00:18:12,800 Speaker 1: that it went live, and for a while it felt 340 00:18:12,840 --> 00:18:17,479 Speaker 1: like it was just technology owners and technology journalists and 341 00:18:17,520 --> 00:18:21,439 Speaker 1: it was awesome. Uh it's still I still very much 342 00:18:21,520 --> 00:18:25,800 Speaker 1: enjoy Google Plus, but you know, there's something a little 343 00:18:26,000 --> 00:18:30,920 Speaker 1: enticing about being part of this exclusive club. I think 344 00:18:31,000 --> 00:18:33,960 Speaker 1: ultimately it's better that it's not exclusive, but you know, 345 00:18:34,240 --> 00:18:36,119 Speaker 1: at the same time, it's kind of cool to be 346 00:18:36,160 --> 00:18:39,760 Speaker 1: one of the cool kids for like a week, so yeah, 347 00:18:39,760 --> 00:18:41,919 Speaker 1: so it's a relatively small scope at the time, and 348 00:18:42,080 --> 00:18:43,960 Speaker 1: in fact, the scope was so small that one of 349 00:18:44,000 --> 00:18:46,639 Speaker 1: the founders would do something shocking. But we'll get to 350 00:18:46,840 --> 00:18:52,639 Speaker 1: that after we take a quick break and thank our sponsors. So, Lauren, 351 00:18:52,680 --> 00:18:56,040 Speaker 1: you alluded to something kind of radical that one of 352 00:18:56,080 --> 00:19:00,320 Speaker 1: the founders of odio would do, and it upen in 353 00:19:00,359 --> 00:19:04,360 Speaker 1: September two thousand and six. It was something that again 354 00:19:04,400 --> 00:19:08,919 Speaker 1: another controversial decision in hindsight, At the time, it didn't 355 00:19:08,960 --> 00:19:12,439 Speaker 1: seem that controversial, but now it surely does. Which is 356 00:19:12,440 --> 00:19:16,200 Speaker 1: that Evan Williams sent out a message to Odio investors 357 00:19:16,240 --> 00:19:18,880 Speaker 1: and said that he wanted to buy back the company's 358 00:19:18,880 --> 00:19:22,320 Speaker 1: stock from the investors because he didn't see the company 359 00:19:22,560 --> 00:19:26,200 Speaker 1: having any real direction. At that point, the podcast platform 360 00:19:26,240 --> 00:19:29,080 Speaker 1: had fallen flat and Twitter was still a very young 361 00:19:29,240 --> 00:19:32,639 Speaker 1: service a right, only a fewer than five thousand people 362 00:19:32,720 --> 00:19:35,359 Speaker 1: had registered for the service and the two months that 363 00:19:35,400 --> 00:19:39,159 Speaker 1: it had been available so far. Right. So eventually Williams 364 00:19:39,400 --> 00:19:43,840 Speaker 1: convinced the investors to accept the buy back. And so, uh, 365 00:19:43,920 --> 00:19:47,720 Speaker 1: there's not really a publicly available figure for how much 366 00:19:48,000 --> 00:19:51,199 Speaker 1: this buyback cost Williams out of his own money, but 367 00:19:51,440 --> 00:19:54,720 Speaker 1: the estimations are somewhere around the five million dollar mark, 368 00:19:54,760 --> 00:19:58,160 Speaker 1: because that's about how much funding Odeo had received earlier, 369 00:19:58,640 --> 00:20:01,719 Speaker 1: So five million dollars. But now the question, and it 370 00:20:01,760 --> 00:20:03,960 Speaker 1: wasn't the question then, but the question now is did 371 00:20:04,040 --> 00:20:07,359 Speaker 1: Williams have any idea how big Twitter was going to become? 372 00:20:07,400 --> 00:20:10,639 Speaker 1: And did he make that buying back in anticipation for 373 00:20:10,800 --> 00:20:14,640 Speaker 1: this crazy popular service? Was it earnest or was he 374 00:20:15,280 --> 00:20:18,920 Speaker 1: plotting ahead? And here's the thing. People describe Williams as 375 00:20:18,920 --> 00:20:25,600 Speaker 1: being incredibly uh, methodical, thoughtful, very quiet, very Some would 376 00:20:25,600 --> 00:20:29,680 Speaker 1: even use the term mackea Bellian. Uh, but that's quite 377 00:20:29,720 --> 00:20:32,600 Speaker 1: a term. It is quite a term. Yeah, that's that's 378 00:20:33,119 --> 00:20:36,400 Speaker 1: that's saying something very specific right there. But I think 379 00:20:36,720 --> 00:20:41,000 Speaker 1: I think everyone agrees that what Williams said was perfectly honest. 380 00:20:41,040 --> 00:20:44,440 Speaker 1: That the service did have fewer than five thousand users. 381 00:20:44,640 --> 00:20:47,080 Speaker 1: So there was no way of knowing at that moment 382 00:20:47,160 --> 00:20:50,640 Speaker 1: if those five thousand would ever be larger, Like there's 383 00:20:50,640 --> 00:20:52,480 Speaker 1: no way of knowing if if they would you know, 384 00:20:52,560 --> 00:20:56,359 Speaker 1: top out at twenty. But they did know that people 385 00:20:56,400 --> 00:20:58,840 Speaker 1: were using it a lot, and they were using it, 386 00:20:59,400 --> 00:21:01,880 Speaker 1: you know, obset Slee is probably being too strong, let's 387 00:21:01,880 --> 00:21:05,840 Speaker 1: say frequently but that that people were and and people 388 00:21:05,880 --> 00:21:08,440 Speaker 1: inside the company were using it so unlike that that 389 00:21:08,480 --> 00:21:11,240 Speaker 1: podcast platform that no one was using. People in the 390 00:21:11,240 --> 00:21:14,320 Speaker 1: company were using it so much that Odio had changed 391 00:21:14,480 --> 00:21:18,480 Speaker 1: its UH employee agreement to actually pick up their text 392 00:21:18,560 --> 00:21:22,080 Speaker 1: messaging fees because people were racking up four D text 393 00:21:22,080 --> 00:21:24,320 Speaker 1: message at the time. That was that was a big deal. 394 00:21:24,400 --> 00:21:26,320 Speaker 1: That was huge. I mean, no one had unlimited text 395 00:21:26,359 --> 00:21:29,359 Speaker 1: plans because who was going to send that many texts? 396 00:21:29,359 --> 00:21:34,080 Speaker 1: And they weren't saying necessarily anything, you know, profound. This was, hey, 397 00:21:34,600 --> 00:21:37,439 Speaker 1: I had an awesome waffle today, like that kind of stuff. 398 00:21:37,680 --> 00:21:40,720 Speaker 1: So there was there's at least some indication that the 399 00:21:40,760 --> 00:21:43,760 Speaker 1: service was compelling. Whether or not he knew that the 400 00:21:43,800 --> 00:21:46,720 Speaker 1: service was ever going to take off is still up 401 00:21:46,720 --> 00:21:50,199 Speaker 1: to a question. Most people, they fall into three camps. 402 00:21:50,960 --> 00:21:53,400 Speaker 1: They're either in the camp of, oh, he totally knew 403 00:21:53,480 --> 00:21:55,120 Speaker 1: that this was going to be a big thing and 404 00:21:55,160 --> 00:21:57,760 Speaker 1: he worked us out of it. Then there's the camp 405 00:21:57,760 --> 00:22:01,359 Speaker 1: of I don't think he pushed us out, but I 406 00:22:01,400 --> 00:22:03,600 Speaker 1: think I wish I had pushed back more. I wish 407 00:22:03,600 --> 00:22:06,000 Speaker 1: I had realized how big this thing was going to be, 408 00:22:06,000 --> 00:22:08,000 Speaker 1: because I I really would have liked a piece of that, 409 00:22:08,800 --> 00:22:11,160 Speaker 1: and then there's a third camp. It's like, No, he 410 00:22:11,240 --> 00:22:14,360 Speaker 1: was probably being very much upfront and honest, and he 411 00:22:14,400 --> 00:22:16,200 Speaker 1: hoped that it would become a big thing, but there 412 00:22:16,280 --> 00:22:18,800 Speaker 1: was no way, no guarantee at the time. Although I 413 00:22:18,800 --> 00:22:21,480 Speaker 1: don't know it's now that I think about it. Williams 414 00:22:21,480 --> 00:22:26,400 Speaker 1: proceeded to change Odia's name to Obvious Corp, which kind 415 00:22:26,400 --> 00:22:29,960 Speaker 1: of obviously this is gonna be huge. I guess there's 416 00:22:29,960 --> 00:22:32,480 Speaker 1: a lot of interpretations we can have in hindsight, but yes, 417 00:22:32,520 --> 00:22:34,520 Speaker 1: that is true. He did change the name Odio to 418 00:22:34,600 --> 00:22:37,600 Speaker 1: Obvious Corps. And he also did something else that that 419 00:22:37,920 --> 00:22:42,240 Speaker 1: again can be a little controversial. He fired Noah Glass. Now, 420 00:22:42,880 --> 00:22:45,440 Speaker 1: without Glass, I think most people would agree Twitter never 421 00:22:45,480 --> 00:22:49,760 Speaker 1: would have happened because Glass was constantly pushing for Twitter 422 00:22:49,880 --> 00:22:53,800 Speaker 1: to be a real product from Odio and he uh, 423 00:22:53,880 --> 00:22:56,639 Speaker 1: he was championing it. He was working on the product 424 00:22:56,680 --> 00:22:58,679 Speaker 1: all the time. He was trying to sell it to 425 00:22:58,760 --> 00:23:01,560 Speaker 1: the rest of Odio, and no one ever made the 426 00:23:01,600 --> 00:23:04,920 Speaker 1: reasons for the firing public. Yeah, I mean it's it's 427 00:23:04,920 --> 00:23:08,080 Speaker 1: we've we've both heard that Williams and Glass didn't apparently 428 00:23:08,119 --> 00:23:10,520 Speaker 1: get along very well. It was a personality class very 429 00:23:10,600 --> 00:23:13,240 Speaker 1: big personality clash in the sense that Williams was this 430 00:23:13,400 --> 00:23:16,800 Speaker 1: very kind of quiet, methodical person and Glass is known 431 00:23:16,840 --> 00:23:20,240 Speaker 1: as being loud and passionate. Some people called him volatile, 432 00:23:20,520 --> 00:23:22,639 Speaker 1: that he could lose his temper when things were not 433 00:23:22,720 --> 00:23:27,160 Speaker 1: going very well, and that the clash of those personalities 434 00:23:27,200 --> 00:23:30,359 Speaker 1: meant that it was just impossible for the two to 435 00:23:30,440 --> 00:23:34,560 Speaker 1: co coincide. They just could not coexist, should say, although 436 00:23:34,600 --> 00:23:37,200 Speaker 1: glass Is also said about it that he he suspects 437 00:23:37,240 --> 00:23:42,000 Speaker 1: he was pushed out by Williams because he Glass originally 438 00:23:42,040 --> 00:23:46,160 Speaker 1: wanted to spend Twitter out of odeo CEO of program. Yeah, 439 00:23:46,160 --> 00:23:49,000 Speaker 1: he said that I have this idea. I think Twitter 440 00:23:49,040 --> 00:23:51,240 Speaker 1: can stand alone as its own thing. I'll be I'll 441 00:23:51,240 --> 00:23:52,639 Speaker 1: be glad to be in charge of it. And at 442 00:23:52,640 --> 00:23:54,480 Speaker 1: the time he was thinking, oh, this is no problem 443 00:23:54,560 --> 00:23:58,159 Speaker 1: because no one else is expressing interest in this product idea, 444 00:23:58,400 --> 00:24:01,159 Speaker 1: and I'm really interested in it, so I'll take it over. 445 00:24:01,560 --> 00:24:04,720 Speaker 1: Everyone will be happy. But then that's not the way 446 00:24:04,760 --> 00:24:08,879 Speaker 1: it unfolded. So Yeah, he's definitely um done some interviews 447 00:24:08,920 --> 00:24:11,879 Speaker 1: more recently where he's kind of uh, you know it. 448 00:24:12,000 --> 00:24:14,880 Speaker 1: I mean, it's it's clear that he hurt runs deep there. 449 00:24:15,040 --> 00:24:17,879 Speaker 1: The pain is deep, because he says that it was 450 00:24:18,560 --> 00:24:21,680 Speaker 1: like being betrayed by your friends, and that he even 451 00:24:21,800 --> 00:24:24,760 Speaker 1: left San Francisco for a few years, went to Los 452 00:24:24,840 --> 00:24:28,240 Speaker 1: Angeles because he couldn't even bear the thought of working 453 00:24:28,240 --> 00:24:32,200 Speaker 1: in that industry anymore because it was such a painful experience. Um. 454 00:24:32,200 --> 00:24:34,520 Speaker 1: He has since come back to San Francisco and has 455 00:24:34,520 --> 00:24:38,760 Speaker 1: worked on other projects, uh, to varying degrees of success, 456 00:24:38,800 --> 00:24:42,840 Speaker 1: nothing obviously as successful as Twitter has been. Right um. 457 00:24:43,040 --> 00:24:45,480 Speaker 1: Over the next few months, the company would continue to 458 00:24:45,600 --> 00:24:51,879 Speaker 1: kind of slowly and quietly grow until until this insane 459 00:24:51,960 --> 00:24:55,439 Speaker 1: thing happened at south By Southwest. Yeah, March two thousand seven. 460 00:24:55,480 --> 00:24:58,800 Speaker 1: It debuts it south By Southwest and this is uh. 461 00:24:58,840 --> 00:25:01,360 Speaker 1: You know. South Southwest is one of those conferences that 462 00:25:01,640 --> 00:25:03,919 Speaker 1: if you are able to make a big splash and 463 00:25:04,000 --> 00:25:07,359 Speaker 1: get a lot of buzz, you are in a great 464 00:25:07,400 --> 00:25:12,440 Speaker 1: position because there's so many high powered executives and employees 465 00:25:12,520 --> 00:25:16,280 Speaker 1: from various companies who all are very influential in their 466 00:25:16,320 --> 00:25:19,360 Speaker 1: own right. If they start talking about your product, then 467 00:25:19,560 --> 00:25:23,240 Speaker 1: you are poised to make a big splash, at least 468 00:25:23,320 --> 00:25:25,879 Speaker 1: in the technology sector. It might take a while for 469 00:25:25,920 --> 00:25:29,240 Speaker 1: that to spill out to other groups, but in technology, 470 00:25:29,320 --> 00:25:33,120 Speaker 1: you are going to you're gonna perform like Gangbusters. Yeah, 471 00:25:33,160 --> 00:25:35,520 Speaker 1: and it won their Web Award that year. Yeah, so 472 00:25:35,640 --> 00:25:39,879 Speaker 1: I mean they definitely made a strong showing. And you know, 473 00:25:39,960 --> 00:25:43,160 Speaker 1: I hear tales about that south By Southwest, about people 474 00:25:43,240 --> 00:25:47,520 Speaker 1: you know, immediately getting addicted to this service Twitter and 475 00:25:47,520 --> 00:25:50,080 Speaker 1: and all joining their own Like everyone at south By 476 00:25:50,080 --> 00:25:53,040 Speaker 1: Southwest created their own little you you know, exclusive club, 477 00:25:53,119 --> 00:25:54,840 Speaker 1: a whole bunch of little people just sitting around in 478 00:25:54,920 --> 00:25:56,919 Speaker 1: rooms tweeting at each other. So the next thing, you know, 479 00:25:57,000 --> 00:26:00,720 Speaker 1: you know, like the CEO of Twitter is getting messages 480 00:26:00,760 --> 00:26:03,920 Speaker 1: from the CEO of Facebook, who's also getting messages from 481 00:26:03,960 --> 00:26:05,480 Speaker 1: you know, it's and it becomes like this kind of 482 00:26:05,520 --> 00:26:10,439 Speaker 1: crazy exclusive club. And it did a lot to raise 483 00:26:10,560 --> 00:26:12,960 Speaker 1: the awareness of Twitter. Although even at this point in 484 00:26:13,000 --> 00:26:16,720 Speaker 1: two thousand seven, I had heard of it but knew 485 00:26:16,760 --> 00:26:21,480 Speaker 1: nothing about it, so I was largely ignorant of what 486 00:26:21,520 --> 00:26:23,360 Speaker 1: Twitter was at this point. I think I had one 487 00:26:23,440 --> 00:26:25,359 Speaker 1: friend who was on Twitter who was talking about it 488 00:26:25,400 --> 00:26:27,480 Speaker 1: being really cool, but I was kind of like, whatever, 489 00:26:27,560 --> 00:26:30,600 Speaker 1: I really can't handle having another social media thing right now. Yeah, 490 00:26:30,680 --> 00:26:33,040 Speaker 1: I mean I was still busy on my Space. I 491 00:26:33,040 --> 00:26:35,879 Speaker 1: didn't join Facebook till two thousand seven, I did so 492 00:26:35,960 --> 00:26:39,080 Speaker 1: much live journaling. I actually did do live journaling too, 493 00:26:39,720 --> 00:26:42,879 Speaker 1: now that I think about it. But yeah, so April 494 00:26:43,560 --> 00:26:47,119 Speaker 1: thousand seven, that's when Twitter uh incorporated, right right right? 495 00:26:47,200 --> 00:26:49,640 Speaker 1: They spun off of Obvious Corpse that month into their 496 00:26:49,680 --> 00:26:52,320 Speaker 1: own separate company. And yeah, so just like a month, 497 00:26:52,440 --> 00:26:54,919 Speaker 1: maybe a month and a half after south By Southwest, 498 00:26:54,960 --> 00:26:57,960 Speaker 1: So at this point you could probably hear Noah Glass 499 00:26:58,760 --> 00:27:02,879 Speaker 1: crying out and be pretty bad. And then only a 500 00:27:02,880 --> 00:27:05,240 Speaker 1: couple of months later they would hold their first round 501 00:27:05,359 --> 00:27:09,520 Speaker 1: of um venture capitalist funding. Yep. And the estimate amount 502 00:27:09,560 --> 00:27:11,920 Speaker 1: because again this was a private company so they don't 503 00:27:11,960 --> 00:27:15,000 Speaker 1: have to release their figures to the public, but the 504 00:27:15,119 --> 00:27:17,440 Speaker 1: estimated amount of money they raised was around five point 505 00:27:17,520 --> 00:27:20,560 Speaker 1: seven million dollars, so already right on par with what 506 00:27:20,680 --> 00:27:23,159 Speaker 1: Odio was raising back in the day. So the company 507 00:27:23,240 --> 00:27:25,560 Speaker 1: that you know, Twitter originally was just gonna be a 508 00:27:25,560 --> 00:27:28,120 Speaker 1: product of Odio. It wasn't going to be its own thing, 509 00:27:28,760 --> 00:27:31,240 Speaker 1: and now it's until it definitely was. Yeah, it's already 510 00:27:31,320 --> 00:27:36,040 Speaker 1: rivaling the company that that's that spawned it. Another big 511 00:27:36,119 --> 00:27:38,840 Speaker 1: happening in two thousand and seven, in August um the 512 00:27:38,920 --> 00:27:43,040 Speaker 1: hashtag debut It was suggested by user Christmas Cina at 513 00:27:43,119 --> 00:27:46,200 Speaker 1: Christmasina who suggested it in in a tweet. He just said, 514 00:27:46,200 --> 00:27:49,360 Speaker 1: how do you feel about using pound for groups as 515 00:27:49,400 --> 00:27:52,520 Speaker 1: in pound bar camp and then message, which made it 516 00:27:52,800 --> 00:27:56,480 Speaker 1: way easier to search for specific things on Twitter. Now, 517 00:27:56,840 --> 00:27:59,520 Speaker 1: at this point, Twitter didn't even have its own uh 518 00:27:59,640 --> 00:28:02,879 Speaker 1: in rated search. You could search tweets through other means, 519 00:28:03,600 --> 00:28:06,160 Speaker 1: but using the hashtag made it a lot easier because otherwise, 520 00:28:06,200 --> 00:28:09,240 Speaker 1: if you just searched a random term, it would pull 521 00:28:09,320 --> 00:28:11,680 Speaker 1: up everything on Twitter that had that word in it. 522 00:28:12,000 --> 00:28:14,399 Speaker 1: With the hashtag, it made it much more easy to 523 00:28:14,640 --> 00:28:18,119 Speaker 1: uh to find something specific. Yeah, so, yeah, it was. 524 00:28:18,200 --> 00:28:20,639 Speaker 1: It was a good idea. In fact, that's another interesting thing. 525 00:28:20,720 --> 00:28:22,679 Speaker 1: I didn't really touch on it in my research, but 526 00:28:22,800 --> 00:28:26,040 Speaker 1: a lot of the innovations of Twitter come to us 527 00:28:26,080 --> 00:28:28,920 Speaker 1: because of the way users use Twitter. It's not something 528 00:28:28,920 --> 00:28:30,960 Speaker 1: that was built by the engineers and then filtered out. 529 00:28:31,000 --> 00:28:34,960 Speaker 1: It was that people saw ways of increasing Twitter's utility, 530 00:28:35,400 --> 00:28:39,200 Speaker 1: and then Twitter said, yeah, we should totally make that 531 00:28:39,400 --> 00:28:42,680 Speaker 1: real like official. It's a greater than some of its 532 00:28:42,680 --> 00:28:45,240 Speaker 1: parts kind of gig. Yeah. Yeah, some people get a 533 00:28:45,280 --> 00:28:48,800 Speaker 1: little more cynical about the approach of that more like 534 00:28:49,080 --> 00:28:51,760 Speaker 1: Twitter is very good at stealing the ideas that users have, 535 00:28:51,840 --> 00:28:55,400 Speaker 1: but let's be we'll be generous, uh at any rate. 536 00:28:55,480 --> 00:28:59,720 Speaker 1: And on in October nine seven, Google acquires Jaiku. So 537 00:28:59,760 --> 00:29:02,080 Speaker 1: you aready know the writings on the wall, and Google 538 00:29:02,080 --> 00:29:04,840 Speaker 1: buys your company. It seems to be I mean, it's 539 00:29:04,880 --> 00:29:08,520 Speaker 1: a joke, but it's also if you look at the 540 00:29:08,520 --> 00:29:11,080 Speaker 1: the number of services that Google has introduced and then 541 00:29:11,120 --> 00:29:13,520 Speaker 1: look at the number of services that Google has uh 542 00:29:13,800 --> 00:29:17,440 Speaker 1: eventually closed the doors on, it's it's a it's not 543 00:29:17,480 --> 00:29:19,880 Speaker 1: a great batting average for Google. Right, It's not like 544 00:29:19,920 --> 00:29:23,720 Speaker 1: there's a ton of of services that were around back 545 00:29:23,760 --> 00:29:27,320 Speaker 1: then that Google introduced that are still around. They tend 546 00:29:27,360 --> 00:29:29,959 Speaker 1: to cannibalize a little bit and steal little bits of 547 00:29:29,960 --> 00:29:33,000 Speaker 1: companies and keep the people in the services that they 548 00:29:33,000 --> 00:29:35,400 Speaker 1: really like and then kind of go ball to the 549 00:29:35,440 --> 00:29:38,080 Speaker 1: whole thing. Yeah, you might see some of the technology 550 00:29:38,120 --> 00:29:40,560 Speaker 1: incorporated and some of the other stuff, like Google Docs 551 00:29:40,680 --> 00:29:45,120 Speaker 1: keeps getting more and more uh advanced and complex, partly 552 00:29:45,160 --> 00:29:48,960 Speaker 1: because some of those features were cannibalized from other services. 553 00:29:49,400 --> 00:29:52,920 Speaker 1: At any rate. Uh. People debated for a while which 554 00:29:52,960 --> 00:29:55,920 Speaker 1: service was going to win out Twitter or Jaiku, but 555 00:29:56,360 --> 00:29:59,400 Speaker 1: Twitter already had a headstart with users. It was much 556 00:29:59,440 --> 00:30:01,720 Speaker 1: better known in United States, had gone through that explosion 557 00:30:01,720 --> 00:30:04,400 Speaker 1: thanks to the south by Southwest, and so it would 558 00:30:04,600 --> 00:30:06,960 Speaker 1: be a few years, but eventually Google would announce it 559 00:30:06,960 --> 00:30:09,880 Speaker 1: would stop supporting Jaiku, closing it down in January two 560 00:30:09,920 --> 00:30:13,200 Speaker 1: thousand twelve. So it did stick around for a really 561 00:30:13,240 --> 00:30:15,520 Speaker 1: long time, longer than I thought it did. It wasn't 562 00:30:15,600 --> 00:30:17,360 Speaker 1: until I did this research that I realized it was 563 00:30:17,360 --> 00:30:19,960 Speaker 1: still around as late as January two twelve. I thought it, 564 00:30:20,400 --> 00:30:24,400 Speaker 1: oh yeah, um, But around around this time, in late 565 00:30:24,400 --> 00:30:27,479 Speaker 1: two thousand seven, Twitter had all of eight employees still 566 00:30:27,520 --> 00:30:30,080 Speaker 1: and they were still very much in development despite all 567 00:30:30,120 --> 00:30:32,880 Speaker 1: of this terrific success that they were finding. Throughout the 568 00:30:32,880 --> 00:30:35,320 Speaker 1: course of the year, it was offline for a total 569 00:30:35,360 --> 00:30:39,200 Speaker 1: of nearly six days for maintenance and overload of servers. Yeah. 570 00:30:39,240 --> 00:30:42,479 Speaker 1: In fact, um that also became a running joke, especially 571 00:30:42,520 --> 00:30:45,160 Speaker 1: in the early days of Twitter, about how frequently is 572 00:30:45,160 --> 00:30:48,040 Speaker 1: Twitter down as opposed to you know what's going on 573 00:30:48,040 --> 00:30:51,240 Speaker 1: on Twitter? Like is Twitter still working right now? Would 574 00:30:51,400 --> 00:30:53,240 Speaker 1: be a joke, and it would continue to be a 575 00:30:53,280 --> 00:30:56,840 Speaker 1: joke for a while. But we'll talk more about that extensively. Actually. Yeah, 576 00:30:57,240 --> 00:31:03,160 Speaker 1: So incredibly important day wers history. March two thousand eight, 577 00:31:04,240 --> 00:31:07,000 Speaker 1: monumental day for Twitter. That was when I sent my 578 00:31:07,080 --> 00:31:10,400 Speaker 1: first tweet from the John Strickland account at John Strickland. 579 00:31:10,400 --> 00:31:13,600 Speaker 1: That's me, Uh, and I wrote the article. Here's the 580 00:31:13,600 --> 00:31:15,920 Speaker 1: tweet says. You know, I wrote the article on how 581 00:31:15,920 --> 00:31:18,680 Speaker 1: Twitter works months ago, and yet I'm just getting into 582 00:31:18,680 --> 00:31:22,200 Speaker 1: it now. And uh. Since then, I've written about fifteen 583 00:31:22,200 --> 00:31:27,120 Speaker 1: thousand more tweets, mostly about what I was eating. April 584 00:31:27,160 --> 00:31:30,000 Speaker 1: two eight, one of the most famous tweets is sent 585 00:31:30,440 --> 00:31:32,840 Speaker 1: in that month, and we're talking about actually famous, not 586 00:31:33,000 --> 00:31:37,200 Speaker 1: not joke famous. This, this is for real from a person. This, 587 00:31:37,200 --> 00:31:41,960 Speaker 1: this tweet affected this person's life phenomenally because if it 588 00:31:42,000 --> 00:31:44,480 Speaker 1: hadn't gone out, I don't know how this person's life 589 00:31:44,480 --> 00:31:47,440 Speaker 1: would have we would be very different. But all the 590 00:31:47,440 --> 00:31:50,760 Speaker 1: tweet said was arrested and it was from James Buck. 591 00:31:50,920 --> 00:31:53,920 Speaker 1: And if you remember, that tweet came from James Buck 592 00:31:53,960 --> 00:31:58,080 Speaker 1: after he had been taken into custody by Egyptian authorities. 593 00:31:58,640 --> 00:32:02,240 Speaker 1: He had attended an anti government protest and was arrested 594 00:32:02,280 --> 00:32:04,920 Speaker 1: as a result. So he sends out this tweet, His 595 00:32:05,000 --> 00:32:07,880 Speaker 1: friends see it, and then they start spreading the word 596 00:32:07,920 --> 00:32:11,160 Speaker 1: around and quit. Before you know it, everyone has heard 597 00:32:11,280 --> 00:32:14,440 Speaker 1: about this uh this tweet going out, and it brings 598 00:32:14,480 --> 00:32:16,640 Speaker 1: the attention of the United States government to the case, 599 00:32:17,080 --> 00:32:21,320 Speaker 1: and eventually the outcry pressures the Egyptian authorities to release Buck, 600 00:32:21,320 --> 00:32:28,000 Speaker 1: who then sends out another tweet free. Pretty awesome. So yeah, interesting, 601 00:32:28,160 --> 00:32:31,720 Speaker 1: interesting story. I remember when that broke, and I think 602 00:32:31,720 --> 00:32:33,920 Speaker 1: it was right around that time where I was really thinking, 603 00:32:34,360 --> 00:32:37,040 Speaker 1: maybe this is more than just a way of me 604 00:32:37,200 --> 00:32:40,320 Speaker 1: expressing any random thought that pops into my head that 605 00:32:40,400 --> 00:32:45,560 Speaker 1: I can whittle down two characters. So May two thousand eight, 606 00:32:45,800 --> 00:32:50,200 Speaker 1: Twitter holds around of funding and secures fifteen million dollars, 607 00:32:50,600 --> 00:32:53,440 Speaker 1: which is interesting when you think this is before Twitter 608 00:32:53,520 --> 00:32:56,320 Speaker 1: had any sort of business plan that I was aware of. 609 00:32:57,760 --> 00:32:59,880 Speaker 1: It was part of the joke at the time, wasn't it. Yeah, yeah, 610 00:32:59,880 --> 00:33:03,040 Speaker 1: they were. They were raising money, but and they were 611 00:33:03,080 --> 00:33:06,800 Speaker 1: spending money, but there was no way of making money 612 00:33:06,840 --> 00:33:09,360 Speaker 1: with Twitter. Everyone agreed that it was important that it 613 00:33:09,440 --> 00:33:11,800 Speaker 1: was useful, that people love the service. They were willing 614 00:33:11,880 --> 00:33:15,600 Speaker 1: to spend hours of their day collectively, maybe not all 615 00:33:15,640 --> 00:33:17,360 Speaker 1: at once, but you know, if you they add up, 616 00:33:17,920 --> 00:33:20,080 Speaker 1: they spent a lot of time on the service. But 617 00:33:20,960 --> 00:33:23,600 Speaker 1: there wasn't any way of monetizing that at the moment. Yeah, 618 00:33:23,640 --> 00:33:26,200 Speaker 1: there wasn't even any plan to begin that that they 619 00:33:26,200 --> 00:33:28,400 Speaker 1: were talking about the public to it anyway. Yeah, yeah, 620 00:33:28,400 --> 00:33:31,400 Speaker 1: they might have had some ideas about advertising or promoted 621 00:33:31,440 --> 00:33:33,720 Speaker 1: tweets or whatever, but that was all internal. None of 622 00:33:33,760 --> 00:33:37,080 Speaker 1: that was was it was communicated outward, and so it 623 00:33:37,200 --> 00:33:39,800 Speaker 1: just became this. The two big jokes about Twitter were 624 00:33:40,560 --> 00:33:43,120 Speaker 1: is the service down? And how the heck are they 625 00:33:43,120 --> 00:33:45,520 Speaker 1: going to make money? Why are people investing millions of 626 00:33:45,560 --> 00:33:48,120 Speaker 1: dollars in this thing that that so far has no 627 00:33:48,160 --> 00:33:51,160 Speaker 1: way of making money making money um? And and that 628 00:33:51,160 --> 00:33:54,760 Speaker 1: that that fail rate was so large that the company 629 00:33:54,840 --> 00:33:58,360 Speaker 1: started its own standalone blog to give users status updates 630 00:33:58,400 --> 00:34:01,680 Speaker 1: on downtime, because, as anyone who has been kind of 631 00:34:01,680 --> 00:34:05,520 Speaker 1: addicted to Twitter knows, it's it's very distressing when when 632 00:34:05,520 --> 00:34:07,880 Speaker 1: you would see that fail whale, which, by the way, 633 00:34:07,960 --> 00:34:09,879 Speaker 1: I think I think the fail whale might even be 634 00:34:10,000 --> 00:34:12,399 Speaker 1: retired now it is it is. I've got a note 635 00:34:12,400 --> 00:34:15,080 Speaker 1: on that later on. But but but some but some 636 00:34:15,160 --> 00:34:17,120 Speaker 1: introduction to to the fail whale. I want to do 637 00:34:17,280 --> 00:34:20,280 Speaker 1: to do a quick side note, um, the fail whale, 638 00:34:20,400 --> 00:34:23,520 Speaker 1: which if you have never seen it before is a 639 00:34:23,560 --> 00:34:26,080 Speaker 1: picture of these kind of cute little birds carrying this 640 00:34:26,160 --> 00:34:28,520 Speaker 1: cute little whale in in this in this net and 641 00:34:28,520 --> 00:34:31,920 Speaker 1: they're flying the whale over over the seas, and and 642 00:34:31,920 --> 00:34:33,960 Speaker 1: it was Twitter's four O four page for a very 643 00:34:34,000 --> 00:34:39,560 Speaker 1: long time. I'm a debut sometime around around two eight UM. 644 00:34:39,600 --> 00:34:42,480 Speaker 1: It had been created by this artist and designer Yeing 645 00:34:42,640 --> 00:34:45,640 Speaker 1: lou Um who just made it as like a virtual 646 00:34:45,680 --> 00:34:48,160 Speaker 1: birthday card to send to friends in other locations around 647 00:34:48,160 --> 00:34:50,359 Speaker 1: the world. She she didn't even have any intent of 648 00:34:50,400 --> 00:34:53,839 Speaker 1: monetizing it for a very long time. The birds, she says, 649 00:34:53,920 --> 00:34:57,000 Speaker 1: we're working against all odds to make the impossible happen 650 00:34:57,440 --> 00:34:59,920 Speaker 1: in her case, particularly being with these far away for 651 00:35:00,040 --> 00:35:02,439 Speaker 1: ends of hers. But eventually she thought it was keute 652 00:35:02,520 --> 00:35:04,600 Speaker 1: enough that she put up on I stock photo and 653 00:35:04,640 --> 00:35:09,320 Speaker 1: that's where Stone grabbed it. And it became so iconic 654 00:35:09,400 --> 00:35:11,760 Speaker 1: that I mean that that she's had like fan clubs 655 00:35:11,800 --> 00:35:14,759 Speaker 1: and T shirts and crazy merchandise made like drinks and 656 00:35:14,800 --> 00:35:17,440 Speaker 1: club events have been named after her. Fail Whale. Yeah. Well, 657 00:35:17,520 --> 00:35:20,440 Speaker 1: I remember when when I first found out that that 658 00:35:20,520 --> 00:35:24,319 Speaker 1: was the the term the fail whale, Like I knew 659 00:35:24,320 --> 00:35:26,680 Speaker 1: that the whale was the four oh four picture. I 660 00:35:26,760 --> 00:35:28,920 Speaker 1: must have seen it a dozen times before anyone had 661 00:35:28,920 --> 00:35:31,440 Speaker 1: called it the fail whale too, and I was like, oh, 662 00:35:31,480 --> 00:35:34,360 Speaker 1: that is cute. So yeah, back in the day, the 663 00:35:34,360 --> 00:35:37,440 Speaker 1: fail whale popped up pretty much any time Twitter servers 664 00:35:37,480 --> 00:35:41,200 Speaker 1: got overloaded, which but as the as the service began 665 00:35:41,280 --> 00:35:45,480 Speaker 1: to gain popularity, they brought more servers onto the whole 666 00:35:45,719 --> 00:35:50,440 Speaker 1: the whole product, but often the use would outstrip the capacity, 667 00:35:50,600 --> 00:35:54,319 Speaker 1: especially spikes. Yeah, like any any event that would have 668 00:35:54,400 --> 00:35:57,200 Speaker 1: a lot of activity around it, so things like you 669 00:35:57,200 --> 00:35:59,759 Speaker 1: pretty much knew that your event had made it when 670 00:35:59,760 --> 00:36:03,600 Speaker 1: you made Twitter crash, right, So south By Southwest was 671 00:36:03,640 --> 00:36:05,799 Speaker 1: a big one because you had a lot of the 672 00:36:05,800 --> 00:36:09,040 Speaker 1: heavy users of Twitter all in one place at one time, 673 00:36:09,560 --> 00:36:13,560 Speaker 1: all active. But other big events, things like the Oscars, 674 00:36:14,200 --> 00:36:18,440 Speaker 1: Super Bowl, you know it loves sporting events. Ce S 675 00:36:18,520 --> 00:36:21,799 Speaker 1: was another one, big one. Yeah, So anytime any any 676 00:36:21,840 --> 00:36:25,200 Speaker 1: company had a big announcement, Apple, Apple was famous for 677 00:36:25,280 --> 00:36:28,239 Speaker 1: making Twitter crash. Anytime Steve Jobs was going to take 678 00:36:28,280 --> 00:36:30,680 Speaker 1: the stage or get it, Twitter is gonna go down. 679 00:36:31,239 --> 00:36:33,440 Speaker 1: So you know that that was you know, it was 680 00:36:33,480 --> 00:36:36,080 Speaker 1: a reality for a long time. These days, it's pretty 681 00:36:36,200 --> 00:36:40,240 Speaker 1: rare to see Twitter not working. They've they've definitely built 682 00:36:40,239 --> 00:36:44,200 Speaker 1: out the redundancy in the capacity quite a bit. And um, 683 00:36:44,280 --> 00:36:46,480 Speaker 1: I can't remember the last time when I tried to 684 00:36:46,560 --> 00:36:48,480 Speaker 1: use Twitter and it was down. In fact, I can 685 00:36:48,520 --> 00:36:51,320 Speaker 1: remember more frequently times when I was trying to reach 686 00:36:51,360 --> 00:36:54,479 Speaker 1: Google services and Google Services were down or Facebook was down, 687 00:36:54,560 --> 00:36:56,439 Speaker 1: But I can't remember the last time Twitter was down. 688 00:36:57,000 --> 00:36:58,799 Speaker 1: It probably wasn't even that long ago. I just wasn't. 689 00:36:59,000 --> 00:37:02,680 Speaker 1: I just wasn't using when it happened. But at any rate, Uh. 690 00:37:02,719 --> 00:37:05,520 Speaker 1: In August two thousand eight, that's when the next huge 691 00:37:05,680 --> 00:37:08,920 Speaker 1: event happens. That's when tech Stuffs episode on Twitter publishes, 692 00:37:08,960 --> 00:37:12,440 Speaker 1: which submits Twitter as a real thing. So west thing 693 00:37:12,440 --> 00:37:15,160 Speaker 1: that was that was pretty but yeah, yeah, you know 694 00:37:15,400 --> 00:37:19,600 Speaker 1: once yeah yeah, I mean, like, you know, A T 695 00:37:19,719 --> 00:37:22,439 Speaker 1: and T was nothing until we covered them last year, 696 00:37:22,560 --> 00:37:28,959 Speaker 1: So um, we're hubris. So October six eight, that's when 697 00:37:29,280 --> 00:37:33,200 Speaker 1: co founder Jack Dorsey steps down as the CEO of Twitter. 698 00:37:33,280 --> 00:37:35,920 Speaker 1: Now he had been acting as CEO for a while, 699 00:37:37,160 --> 00:37:40,680 Speaker 1: but he ends up becoming the chairman of the board. Meanwhile, 700 00:37:40,880 --> 00:37:44,759 Speaker 1: the chairman of the board, Evan Williams, becomes the CEO. 701 00:37:44,920 --> 00:37:47,360 Speaker 1: So they do what I call the old corporate switcher 702 00:37:47,400 --> 00:37:51,840 Speaker 1: root they just switched places. Now. Uh. One of the 703 00:37:51,920 --> 00:37:53,920 Speaker 1: articles I read it was from the New York Times 704 00:37:53,920 --> 00:37:58,160 Speaker 1: and actually cited employees saying Dorsey was not the easiest 705 00:37:58,200 --> 00:38:01,640 Speaker 1: man to work for that his he's he was, he 706 00:38:01,719 --> 00:38:05,600 Speaker 1: was brilliant, but his leadership skills were, or maybe his 707 00:38:05,840 --> 00:38:09,799 Speaker 1: personnel skills of being able to handle personal relationships over 708 00:38:10,239 --> 00:38:12,839 Speaker 1: you know, that it was just rough that if things 709 00:38:12,840 --> 00:38:18,120 Speaker 1: weren't going well, it made the employment process uncomfortable. Maybe 710 00:38:18,320 --> 00:38:21,120 Speaker 1: his vision was terrific, but his day to day running 711 00:38:21,200 --> 00:38:23,560 Speaker 1: of the company was less than ideal something like that, 712 00:38:23,600 --> 00:38:27,080 Speaker 1: at least from the employee standpoint. Right. So Williams takes 713 00:38:27,120 --> 00:38:30,520 Speaker 1: over and Dorsey ends up being the chairman of the board, 714 00:38:30,520 --> 00:38:34,839 Speaker 1: and according to at least some of the articles I read, 715 00:38:34,880 --> 00:38:39,320 Speaker 1: Dorsey's uh, Dorset's change meant that he was no longer 716 00:38:39,360 --> 00:38:43,000 Speaker 1: really involved in the company in any day to day 717 00:38:44,440 --> 00:38:46,319 Speaker 1: But Dorsey was working on some other stuff too. So 718 00:38:46,320 --> 00:38:50,000 Speaker 1: we'll talk about that later, because we have reached the 719 00:38:50,000 --> 00:38:53,200 Speaker 1: point where we are going to conclude this episode. We 720 00:38:53,239 --> 00:38:56,239 Speaker 1: are going to pick up and UH and explain what 721 00:38:56,320 --> 00:38:59,719 Speaker 1: happens after this switcheroo. A lot of stuff happens in 722 00:38:59,760 --> 00:39:04,239 Speaker 1: twit history, but guys, if you have any suggestions for 723 00:39:04,360 --> 00:39:07,480 Speaker 1: topics that we should cover here on tech Stuff, let 724 00:39:07,600 --> 00:39:10,000 Speaker 1: us know. Maybe there's a company you've always wanted to 725 00:39:10,040 --> 00:39:12,840 Speaker 1: hear about that we haven't covered, or maybe it's a 726 00:39:12,840 --> 00:39:16,200 Speaker 1: technology or maybe it's just some sort of trend in technology. 727 00:39:16,239 --> 00:39:20,040 Speaker 1: Anything is is available, Just let us know. Send us 728 00:39:20,040 --> 00:39:23,040 Speaker 1: a message on email. Our address is tech Stuff at 729 00:39:23,200 --> 00:39:26,040 Speaker 1: Discovery dot com, or you can drop us a line 730 00:39:26,040 --> 00:39:28,200 Speaker 1: on one of the many social networks that we like 731 00:39:28,320 --> 00:39:33,040 Speaker 1: to hang out on Twitter, why do you know, Yeah, 732 00:39:33,200 --> 00:39:36,439 Speaker 1: at tech Stuff hs W for Twitter, and we're also 733 00:39:36,520 --> 00:39:40,839 Speaker 1: tech Stuff HSW on Facebook and the Tumblers. So come 734 00:39:40,920 --> 00:39:43,239 Speaker 1: check us out, be part of this, and we will 735 00:39:43,280 --> 00:39:48,759 Speaker 1: talk to you again really soon for more on this 736 00:39:48,920 --> 00:39:51,399 Speaker 1: and bouthands of other topics. Does it has to works 737 00:39:51,440 --> 00:39:57,560 Speaker 1: dot com