Get your own #dickbar

http://encodedrecords.com/dickbar/

by davewiner • 15 years ago

147 60 15 years ago

encodedrecords.com

siculars• 15 years ago

Mark Beeson (@m242), you, Sir, are #winning.

siglesias2• 15 years ago

Twitter's new business model may well be subscriptions to turn off #dickbar.

flyosity4• 15 years ago

I suggested that to @stop on Twitter but didn't get a response.

In all seriousness though, I want to give Twitter money. It has contributed to my career in ways I'll never be able to fully measure and I feel like I owe Twitter something. Ads and intrusive trend bars are annoying, so I'd much rather give money. Monthly plans, yearly plans, "pro" plans... I don't care. They just need to get something in place.

siglesias2• 15 years ago

Precisely.

We follow who we follow because we aren't interested in the rest. It's really bad to force follow a source of information that we don't care about. These ads are way not relevant.

phlux3• 15 years ago

Would you pay $.99 per month for the same twitter everything you have now?

eli• 15 years ago

No, I think the model is still ads. But if you give people the ability to pay to avoid ads, then the most dedicated twitter users will do so and your ads will dramatically decline in value. Why would an advertiser want to reach only the least engaged segment of your audience?

Qz• 15 years ago

I think your sarcasm detector might be a little faulty...

cletus• 15 years ago

It seems that no one is interested in the model where subscribers pay for no ads. Look at Hulu. You can buy Hulu Plus and... still get ads. If Hulu Plus was ad free I would sign up immediately.

So why is that? There are several potential reasons:

1. Those providing such services like advertising or, rather, they like the relationships they have with advertisers. Consider [1] (second time quoted this today!):

> Since the carriers had all the power, getting any distribution (which usually meant getting on the handset “deck”) meant doing a business development deal with the carriers. Business development in this case meant finding the right people at those companies, sending them iPods, taking them to baseball games, and basically figuring out ways to convince them to work with you instead of the 5,000 other people sending them iPods and baseball tickets. The basis of competition was salesmanship and capital, not innovation or quality.

Companies, and particularly sales guys, like having something to sell (being ad inventory). They like the perks this gets them (and the commissions of course).

2. Subscribers aren't willing to pay what the advertising brings in. I'm curious about this but haven't seen any numbers. Take an episode of The Big Bang Theory. How much does each episode cost to produce? How much does each ad bring in? How much does the national network earn in affiliate fees? How much of the advertising revenue is product placement? If you had these numbers, you could calculate what each viewer is worth. I suspect it's a lot less than what such companies charge on iTunes and elsewhere;

3. A correlation between the people willing to pay for no ads and being the target of those ads, which means if you're willing to pay for no ads, you need to pay higher than what ad revenue / viewers might otherwise suggest; and

4. Lack of metrics in broadcast and print media. Sales guys are known to exaggerate (and basically just make up) conversion numbers on ad campaigns. The reality I'm sure is a lot less but there's no real way to tell. With online advertising, you can tell, which possibly explains it's lower cost/value compared to traditional advertising;

5. Related to (4), people pay for broadcast and print advertising what they do, largely because that's what it's always cost; and

6. Limited inventory drives up the cost. Inventory is not a problem online.

As for Twitter, I suspect they haven't done anything interesting with advertising (and monetization) because that's a hard problem to solve. I mean, people need to see ads for them to be ads right? At that point, how exactly are you going to advertise to people who mostly use an API, other than through their Twitter stream?

[1] http://cdixon.org/2010/06/06/steve-jobs-single-handedly-rest...

Deadsunrise• 15 years ago

Spotify . You have a free plan with ads, one without ads, and the premium plan with mobile access and offline play.

http://www.spotify.com/uk/get-spotify/overview/

dpatru• 15 years ago

If broadcasters offered an ad-free option, presumably their best audience (from advertisers' view) would choose this. This would make the ad audience much less lucrative for the broadcasters.

macrael• 15 years ago

I forget where I read this recently, but someone pointed out that magazines cost money to buy, but are chocablock full of ads. Apparently, the revenue from subscriptions and people buying the magazine at newsstands is insignificant compared to the advertising revenue.

Furthermore, the cost of the magazine was used to get more money from advertisers. Since people are shelling out X amount of dollars for the magazine, the sales team can use that to argue that their readers are of a certain income bracket.

So, it could be option 2+, subscribers aren't bringing in anywhere near the amount of money they are getting from advertisers, and they may charge advertisers more*to advertise to their paying customers because they have proven they have already shown a willingness to pay for things (online things.)

raganwald2• 15 years ago

What is a dickbar?

http://dickbar.org

rhizome• 15 years ago

that expander thing is weird.

kcl• 15 years ago

In 2010 I wanted an iPhone Twitter client with a nice UI and no ads, so I paid $2.99 for Tweetie 2. This was after I bought Tweetie 1 for $2.99. Tweetie 2 wasn't a free upgrade.

In 2011, after acquiring Tweetie 2 and making it free, Twitter adds paid advertisements and wrecks the UI.

flyosity4• 15 years ago

Reminds me of many Android apps: instead of selling the app on the Marketplace the developers opt to include advertisements which cheapen the overall experience.

code_duck3• 15 years ago

Angry Birds is a great example. I would gladly pay the piddly .99c they ask on iOS, if given the choice! The iOS version is paid only and ad free, while the Android version is free only, with intrusive ads.

raganwald2• 15 years ago

I would email Dick and ask for a special ad-free version that goes out to all paid Tweetie customers.

PanMan• 15 years ago

Unfortunately, that isn't possible in the AppStore, afaik. You can sell to everyone, or give away for free, but not to a limited group (beyond the 100 promo codes thing.)

X-Istence2• 15 years ago

Those of us who weren't using twitter at the time shouldn't have to deal with the #dickbar either, add a paid option in general, sure make it free for Tweetie1/2 customers, but provide the option to everyone!

webwright• 15 years ago

Startups make mistakes... I'm pretty surprised that Twitter is responding with "It's a feature, not a bug. This is something you WANT-- trust us!"

http://twitter.com/#!/dickc/status/43500398450982912 http://twitter.com/#!/dickc/status/44302983839756288

Bummer.

kyleslattery• 15 years ago

Sounds like they'll be either changing or removing it: http://twitter.com/twittermobile/status/43730986864885760

devtesla• 15 years ago

Guess: they will make it hide-able but on by default. It'll stop the complaining while still giving advertisers more hits than they might have before the dickbar. Win win

kmfrk• 15 years ago

How can the CEO of Twitter be so clueless, though? It's like reading an Eric Schmidt interview.

xpaulbettsx• 15 years ago

If the Dickbar annoys you as much as it annoys me and your phone is jailbroken, install the Twizzler package to remove it. Makes the new Twitter actually a quite nice upgrade.

moblivu• 15 years ago

Am I the only who's not getting the purpose of this "Dickbar" ?

kristofferR• 15 years ago

The dickbar can be removed from iPhone Twitter with the jailbreak application Twizzler: http://www.tipb.com/2011/03/03/twizzler-removes-trending-bar...

X-Istence2• 15 years ago

I would like to point out that there is an app called Twizzler, or more "patch" on Cydia that takes care of the problem:

http://isource.com/2011/03/05/twizzler-the-jailbreak-answer-...

Courtesy of @chpwn.

pclark• 15 years ago

it's as if the founding product driving force at Twitter have left.

gsmaverick• 15 years ago

Most of them are gone.

SandB0x• 15 years ago

This is the height of inanity.

jagtesh• 15 years ago

More free publicity for Twitter, great.

Get your own #dickbar

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