Observations from Twitter’s @replies fiasco

Posted by Bhavishya Kanjhan on May 17, 2009 in Default | 0 comments

Most of you are probably aware of the Twitter @reply issue that happened a few days ago. For those unaware, Twitter removed the option to receive all @replies from users you weren’t following. This was disabled by default so as to not confuse or possibly intimidate the user with the immense amount of tweets that would appear in the stream. Twitter for its part, passed it on as a deliberate feature removal based on “usage patterns and feedback“. A second blog post then attributed it to the engineering issues, possibly relating to scalability. A third blog post then revealed Twitter decided to halfway backtrack on the change, only hiding messages which explicitly use the reply icon.

The users made their voice heard in a manner which was reminiscent of Digg’s HD-DVD backlash a little over two years ago. Users started tweeting in revolt of the feature change and tagging their replies with #fixreplies. Secondly, a lot of users found a way around the system. By preceding the username by “to:” or “>” users could send out a tweet addressed to a single user but distributed to all.

Key Observations

1. Twitter could have avoided a PR Disaster had they come clean with the issue to begin with. Removing a feature which was disabled by default (due to its possibly overwhelming nature) but still important to the power users and then further on miscommunicating the reason for its removal seemed like an insult to the intelligence of its user base. Leaving very little unchanged after the backtrack showed its feeble attempts at displaying a backbone of sorts.

2. When the users started ‘forcing’ replies to all their followers by their workarounds, that was, in principle, not very different to what Twitter was doing. Twitter’s removal of the option took away the choice from the users to view the replies, whereas the workaround forced by a single user took away the choice from his/her followers to not receive them.

Neither Twitter nor the users stand wrong or right. The company owns the service and has the right to change the product in any manner it pleases. The users will voice their opinions and try their best to get their way. We’ve seen this in the case of Digg, we’ve seen this in the case of Facebook too. The best thing to do is to learn the lesson from the incident, which in this case was the mishandling of communication and make sure at least that is avoided for next time.

It doesn’t matter if Apple isn’t making a lot of money with the App Store

Posted by Bhavishya Kanjhan on May 15, 2009 in Default | 0 comments

Lightspeed Venture partners is reporting Apple may have only made around $20-45 million from the 1 billion applications downloaded in the 9 months. Taking the paid to free ratio to be in the range of 1:15 to 1:40 and the mean price to be $2.65, they arrive to a revenue of $70-160 million, 30% of which is the magic number they have come up with.

Clearly the App Store is far from a cash cow for Apple, especially when compared to the money its hardware lineup brings in. SDKs and development platforms in general have been around for a long time now but it is the distribution of these apps which had been a source of frustration for developers. By making them all available at one place, Apple has simplified the distribution chain and in turn generated  an additional source of revenue for it, no matter how small it may be.

The greatest source of pride, however, for Apple will be that the App Store is (or was) a source of competitive advantage for them and has converted potential buyers into buying consumers. Take a look at an iPhone running 1.x version of the OS and it looks practically naked when compared to a fairly used 2.x one. At the end of it all, even if Apple was breaking even with the App Store it wouldn’t matter because it’s served as a major pull factor enticing buyers.

Facebuk: Im In Ur Famlee Monitizing Ur Releshunship!

Posted by Bhavishya Kanjhan on May 9, 2009 in Default | 0 comments

So you already know that  from Sunday – on occasion of Mother’s Day – Facebook will let you list your parents, siblings and children as relationships on Facebook. Aww, warms my heart. Great news for everyone.

Who is going to like this especially? Why it’s the ad sales team at Facebook. Not only do they have information about you as an individual, now they know you as part of a (real life) network. What does that mean? More specifically targeted ads. Got young kids? Here’s an ad for pampers. Old parents?  Buy them a pair of Reading glasses, or a massage, whatever. Sibling in a different part of the world? Here have a cheap ticket, special offer, discount on hotel.

Do I sound like a cynic? I don’t mean to. It’s a great move on part of Facebook. Relevant ads are increasingly important for firms to maximise their ROI. It’s these very ads that improve the signal to noise ratio towards the potential consumer. Moral of the story, everybody wins. Right?

(Image via Steve Tracy)

Facebook lets you put Yo Moma and the others on your profile page. Will you?

Posted by Bhavishya Kanjhan on May 9, 2009 in Default | 1 comment

Your significant other isn’t the only one who you’ll be in a relationship with over Facebook now. In celebration of Mother’s Day, Facebook will let you list your parents, siblings and children (maybe more?) under the appropriately named “Family Member” section within your profile. A request will be sent to the user who will then, hopefully, accept it and the relationship will be shown on both profile. Easy Peasy.

There is already a website dedicated to the enthusiasm and excitement of parents joining Facebook by them kids. This is exactly the kind of thing that they (me too) have been waiting for to accept the ‘friend’ request from our parents. Before that it just seemed demeaning and insulting.

As for parents, what could give them more joy than to share the name, age and other personal information (profile) of their kids on their Facebook page. Tears of Joy flow everywhere.

Jokes aside, this is a great idea. The feature is long overdue, especially with the demographic spreading far beyond the original college and high school audience. Whether the demographic chooses to use it or not is something we’re going to have to wait to see; especially the college and high school students many of who are who are far from happy with their parents and uncles and aunts sending them ‘friend requests’.