Why Twitter Is The Next Google, But Better

http://fourreasonswhy.com/2008/04/24/twitter-is-the-next-google-but-better/

by buckpost • 18 years ago

9 16 18 years ago

jraines• 18 years ago

This is asinine.

ssharp• 18 years ago

This article is a little ridiculous. Although I'm not a Twitter user, so maybe I don't fully understand the dynamics of using it as a search agent. From what I do know about it, I know I wouldn't want to use it.

1. Twitter has nowhere close to the amount of users that Google has and never will.

2. There is no measure of quality for the types of results you're going to get back. One man's treasure is another mans trash and I don't want to get a bunch of garbage thrown at me.

3. Google is always there and I can search it to my hearts content. If I start bugging my entire Twitter network with requests, I'll lose my network quickly.

4. I'm not sure how this creates any productivity. If you have friends willing to do your searches for you, they're losing productivity and it's not even zero sum, it's a multiple of how many responses you get and you yourself aren't really gaining all that much in probability.

5. Your trusted network can go down at any time. What happens when people aren't around or somebody you once trusted Goatse's you? You'll be crawling back to Google in no time.

cstejerean• 18 years ago

twitter is useful for getting recommendations from your network (or even random people). If you go to a new city twitter could be useful I'm finding a great restaurant, etc. It's the kind of "search" you can do on Google but would be harder than simply asking your Twitter network.

axod• 18 years ago

I almost spat out my drink when reading the title let alone the article. Surely this is satire.

wmeredith• 18 years ago

I like it that one of the reasons they're the next Google is they don't have a business model yet. Hey, come to think of it neither does my morning commute, maybe it's the next Google.

metatronscube• 18 years ago

This is stupid, plain and simple.

Tichy• 18 years ago

Before twitter, people were crowdsourcing on Usenet.

Readmore• 18 years ago

Hahah. that's funny.

No, No, No. Twitter as a search tool, are you kidding me?

poppysan• 18 years ago

It's good that people still have a sense of humor. I almost believed he was serious with this story.

Please say he wasn't serious...

cellis• 18 years ago

From the comments:

Google is a fucking verb among the common man now, Twitter is a joke.

alyx• 18 years ago

With excitement I loaded the HN comments for this story only to find that everybody had already beaten me to bashing the insanity of this story. :)

diego• 18 years ago

Twitter has a lot of useful information in it. It's not popular enough yet, but the application does have a lot of appeal. The tool we built (shameless plug again) made me realize how interesting it is to see what people are doing in real time:

http://twist.flaptor.com

Baltropreneur2• 18 years ago

yes thanks for the tool i was using it for our market research ! Unfortunately though it looks like the API restricts any search topics beyond 200. Is that correct?

Maybe Twitter allows for a fee to access all tweets on a search topic from day one?

Monti• 18 years ago

I am frankly not going to read the article, the title is enough.

Baltropreneur2• 18 years ago

Umm do you guys not see the incredible value of indexing the thoughts of millions of people? How about having access to millions of consumers' email inbox - basically that is what Twitter is!

Companies can use it to monitor their brand and provide better service. The market research industry could be negatively impacted and other things too!

I thought Twitter was so dumb, but once you get enough followers you will see the immense value and hopefully innovate from there!

zealog• 18 years ago

The title is hyperbole, but the core idea - recommended search by contacts - is what EVERYONE is trying to do. Even Google has admitted to such.

I don't know that Twitter will ever be able to make use of it, but there are some bones there (mentioned in this article) that represent the next great frontier in better searching.

Why Twitter Is The Next Google, But Better

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