Tag: microblogging

What if Twitter had been built by Amazon.com's Web Services team?

twitter by aws? I’ve been using Twitter for a long time now, and I can’t remember a period of downtime quite as bad as the current one. Features have been disabled, and there’s no ETA for when everything will be back to normal. Who knows, maybe it won’t ever be. Which got me wondering about why Twitter’s reliability is so terrible. Is it the nature of the application, or is it something to do with the people behind Twitter?

What if Twitter had been built by a different team, a team with a pretty good track record for high-availability services? What if Twitter had been built by the Web Services team at Amazon.com?

I think it’s safe to say that things would be quite different:

  1. Reliable, redundant infrastructure
    Twitter would be run inside Amazon’s high-availability data centers. We would never know (or care) that Twitter’s main database was named db006, nor would we ever wonder whether it has a good backup. We’d just know that if it’s good enough for Amazon, it’s good enough for us.
  2. No wondering, “is Twitter working?”
    Instead of wondering if Twitter is working correctly or waiting for Twitter messages or blog posts that explain what the problem is, Twitter would be part of the AWS Service Health Dashboard. We’d be able to see, at a glance, how Twitter is working now, and how well it has worked for the last month. This is what transparency is all about.
  3. Twitter wouldn’t be free, but we’d be cool with that
    Twitter would have had a business model from day one, and we’d all be cheering about how affordable it is. A pay-as-you-go model like all the other web services from Amazon would work quite well for Twitter. You get what you pay for, right?
  4. Premium Support and SLAs
    Speaking of getting what you pay for, Amazon would likely have realized that there are lots of different types of users, and they’d react accordingly. We’d probably have Premium Support for Twitter, to service support requests more efficiently. We’d also have Service Level Agreements.
  5. We wouldn’t call it Twitter…
    Of course, the service wouldn’t be called Twitter. In keeping with Amazon’s other services it would probably have a name like “Amazon Simple Messaging Service”, or SMS for short. Though I suppose that acronym is already taken!

I am a huge Twitter fan, and I really do hope that Ev, Biz, Jack, and the rest of the team get things working and fixed. With every passing hour of downtime though, I lose a little bit of faith. I wonder if Twitter would be better off in someone else’s hands.

Of course, if Twitter really had been built by AWS, there would be far more differences than just the items in my list above. The service may not be recognizable as Twitter!

That doesn’t mean that they couldn’t adopt some of these items as improvements, however. I’d love to see an official Twitter health dashboard, for instance. One can hope.

Twitter doesn't know what's wrong

twitter Even occasional Twitter users will no doubt be familiar with the service’s frequent downtime. It’s a rare day when I don’t run into at least one or two “something’s technically wrong” messages on the site. That has prompted a lot of discussion about how to improve Twitter, and also some discussion about how things could be so bad.

I’ve been willing to cut them some slack. They’ve grown exponentially, and continue to do so. Then on Wednesday, Twitter founder Jack posted this on the official blog:

We’ve gone through our various databases, caches, web servers, daemons, and despite some increased traffic activity across the board, all systems are running nominally. The truth is we’re not sure what’s happening. It seems to be occurring in-between these parts.

Transparency is great, but surely they must have some idea about what’s wrong? I don’t know much about their architecture or systems, but it seems odd to me that they’d be totally stumped. It suggests to me that their architecture was never designed, and was instead thrown together over time. Now they’re in too deep to start over.

Twitter developer Alex suggests that the main problem is the system was originally put together as a content management system, when in reality it’s a messaging system. If that’s the case, fine, but messaging systems are not new. They must be able to examine and learn from some existing stuff right?

Posts like the one Jack made don’t inspire much confidence that they’ll be able to turn things around, but I sure hope they do. I really love Twitter. Maybe the $15 million in additional funding that they recently secured will help.

Brightkite is cool so far

brightkite The latest shiny-new-toy that people seem to be playing with is Brightkite, a location-based social network. You can think of it as a sort of Twitter for location information. I’ve been using it for the last few days and so far I like what I see.

Brightkite started as a TechStars startup, and they recently closed a round of funding. CNET posted a decent writeup on the company today which includes some good background information, so check that out if you want to learn more about them.

To get started with Brightkite, you need to “check in” at a location. You can do this by specifying an address, business, or a “placemark”. Placemarks are like saved locations, so you could create a placemark called “Home” with your home address. In my testing thus far, searching for addresses is excellent but searching for businesses never returns anything.

Once you’ve checked in, Brightkite will show you people who are near you, and you can look at people who have visited that location in the past. You can also post notes (like a status update) and photos at your location. In case you’re wondering, Brightkite actually has really excellent privacy control options, so you can choose who can see your location and to what level of detail.

Like Twitter, I think Brightkite is something you need to use to truly grok. Here are my favorite things about the service thus far:

  • I think they’ve nailed the basic concepts. Placemarks make sense, and checking in at a location isn’t as cumbersome as you might think.
  • They use Twitter and Satisfaction for customer service. They’re also bloggers.
  • Just yesterday they launched a wicked iPhone interface. I love it!
  • I find the main web interface friendly and easy-to-use.

Of course, Brightkite is far from perfect. Some things I’d love to see improved:

  • The SMS interface doesn’t work in Canada. Brightkite would be a million times more useful if I could update via text message.
  • You can update via email, but it’s really picky about not having signatures and other content in the body.
  • Brightkite will show you the places you’ve visited and how many times you’ve visited them, but I think what would be really useful is the ability to see your routes on a map.

Another huge item for me is an API, and the only reason I left it out of the list above is that I know they’re actively working on it. I think Brightkite usage could explode if they do the API right, a la Twitter.

Of course, a social network is really only useful if there are people on it and that’s definitely one thing that is keeping me from truly experiencing Brighkite. There are a few Edmonton people on the service, but not enough that I’ve been close to anyone yet! I have four invites left if you’d like to join 🙂

I am eager to see how Brightkite improves and grows. With a few more features and some tweaking, it could become extremely useful for me. There are a bunch of location-based services out there, but so far Brightkite is the first one I’ve really liked.

EdmontonTweetup1 – May 10th

edmontontweetup A month ago I wondered if anyone would come to an EdmontonTweetup, a meetup for Twitter users in Edmonton. I’m still not exactly sure what we’re going to talk about, but enough people have expressed interest that we’re going ahead with the event. Here are the details:

WHO: Twitter users in Edmonton!
WHAT: An event to meet one another in meatspace.
WHERE: Three Banana’s Cafe in Churchill Square (map)
WHEN: Saturday, May 10th, at 12pm noon
WHY: To chat about all things Twitter with like-minded folks!

You can see the above details as well as a partial list of attendees on our wiki page for the event. Feel free to add yourself to the list. There are also Facebook and Upcoming events if that’s more your style. You may also want to follow edmontontweetup or myself on Twitter for updates.

I’m really looking forward to meeting everyone – hope to see you there!

Twitter the next Google? Not likely!

twitter One of my favorite blogs to read is the Four (or Five!) Reasons Why blog, written by Mark and Sean Evans. Sometimes they post serious entries (…Earth Hour Is Legit And Significant) and sometimes they post funny entries (…Aquaman Is The Lamest Superhero Of All Time). Today they posted an entry titled …Twitter Is The Next Google, But Better. I can’t tell if it’s funny or serious.

Their main argument is that Twitter is a new, better approach to search:

2. Twitter has accomplished what nobody, not even Google, has yet to figure out – crowdsourcing search.

4. Not only has Twitter inadvertently taken crowdsouring to search, it has actually taken it a step further into friendsourcing. In fact, it has created the first personalized and trusted search engine in the world.

All five statements are very bold, like the two I’ve pulled out above. Google is a giant – it’s difficult to compare anything to Google, let alone Twitter. Not surprisingly, the comments on the post are mostly shock and ridicule – “You’re out of your mind”.

I love Twitter. I’m completely enamored with it, and I recommend it to everyone I know. I get extremely frustrated when they have reliability issues like everyone else, but I always come back. I think Twitter has tremendous potential, but I’d be very hesitant to declare it the next Google.

I remember when Twitter first launched. At the time I was heavily involved in podcasting and I tracked every bit of Odeo-related news that came up. When I saw them launch Twttr (as it was spelled at first), I remember thinking they were getting sidetracked by useless little projects. Who would ever use a service that only allowed 140 characters at a time?

Clearly I was wrong. Twitter turned out to be far more interesting (and useful) than Odeo ever was. Today, I wonder how I ever got along without Twitter. I use it in a number of ways – to display my “status” on the web, as a public instant messenger, and yes as a way of searching without searching. It’s amazing how interesting stuff just comes into the river.

Twitter is new, shiny, and useful. You can definitely use it as a personalized search engine of sorts, and who knows how it’ll be used in the future. The sky is the limit. To say that it is the next Google is a bit of a stretch, however.

Read: …Twitter Is The Next Google, But Better

FoodFeed and other Twitter dependents

foodfeed As Twitter is used by more and more people, the ecosystem around it continues to grow. There are lots of client applications of course, and increasingly, there are lots of services which leverage and in fact depend on Twitter. I came across another one today, called FoodFeed:

foodfeed is a service that helps you share your eating habits with everyone, from anywhere. Just be sure Mom doesn’t get your feed.

Here’s how it works:

  1. Follow the @having account on Twitter.
  2. You get a website generated for your username – mine is http://mastermaq.foodfeed.us
  3. Post updates by prefixing what you’re eating with @having, or by sending the service a direct message (on Twitter, that would be “d having” followed by whatever you’re eating).

I kind of like the concept, so I’ll use it for a little while. It creates a network within the larger Twitter network. Wondering who likes Coke? You can search for people who do.

FoodFeed is also interesting because it cannot survive without Twitter. Like most of these services, it contains Google ads, but I can’t imagine the creator makes much from that. What would happen to FoodFeed if Twitter started charging for API access? What if Twitter goes down? FoodFeed is only useful as long as Twitter continues to exist and enable access.

Some services, like my favorite Remember the Milk, use Twitter as just another method of interaction. RTM doesn’t depend on Twitter at all. FoodFeed on the other hand does depend on Twitter, and I think that makes it both easier to use and less useful at the same time.

EdmontonTweetup anyone?

twitter A few weeks ago status_girl, myself, and a few other local people on Twitter started throwing around the idea of having a meetup (for some reason it seems weird to use a Twitter friend’s real name until I’ve met them…status_girl is actually Melanie Nathan). She created a Twitter account, etowntwits, and asked anyone who was interested to follow it. So far, twelve people have.

Nothing happened since then, and I started thinking about it again a couple days ago. I learned that there is actually a name for these events; a Twitter meetup is called a Tweetup. It seems to be less organized than a barcamp, but a quick Google search reveals Tweetups happening in Buffalo, Atlanta, Huntsville, Boston, and many other places. Why not Edmonton?

So being the geek that I am, I registered edmontontweetup.org, and created the requisite Twitter account. There’s nothing at the website yet, but I think a wiki or something would work well. Every day I find interesting new local people on Twitter, so I think a Tweetup would work quite well!

A few location ideas that have been thrown around so far are Three Bananas Cafe downtown in Churchill Square, Cargo & James Tea on Whyte, as well as the other coffee shops along Whyte Avenue. The first two have free Wi-Fi which makes them especially attractive.

If you’re on Twitter, would you come to an EdmontonTweetup to meet your fellow tweeters? If you’re not on Twitter, would you come to learn what it’s all about?

On a related note, I came across TwitterLocal today, which is a cool site that helps you find people on Twitter near you. Here’s a list of people near Edmonton.

Two Thousand Posts Later

I don’t know exactly when I started blogging, but it was around the time of the oldest post I have saved. In the 1587 days since that time, I’ve made 2000 posts – yes, this one is #2000! I figure that’s a pretty decent milestone, so I wanted to share a few thoughts with you.

I’ve always said that I blog for myself first, and everyone else second. That’s still the case, and it’s the main reason that I don’t have any ads on here (I also don’t think they’d provide much value to my readers). I’m always surprised when I read old posts because they offer a glimpse into how I’ve grown and changed over the years. Sometimes I think to myself, “did I really write that?”

Me on the tablet

Both my style of writing and the topics I write about have changed quite a bit. Here’s a sample comparison, March 2004 and March 2007:

Except for the little exercise above, I don’t think I’ve ever gone back to look at my posts from March 2004. I’ve referred to the ones from March 2007 many times though (as have others). I think it’s safe to say that I’m writing more interesting and useful content now than I used to.

Another really obvious change is that my posts are a lot longer than they used to be. The increase in quality is part of the reason for that, but the biggest reason is probably Twitter. When I started out, microblogging wasn’t even a thought let alone a word. Now it’s an increasingly popular activity, with dozens of sites (such as Tumblr) offering the ability to post short thoughts, links, or images. I used to post things like “Arrived in Calgary” to my blog, now I just use Twitter.

The tools and technologies I use to blog have changed as well. I started out on dasBlog, moved to .Text, then Community Server, and I’m now on WordPress. I’ve used a variety of posting tools, such as w.Blogger and Windows Live Writer (which I use almost exclusively now). I wouldn’t be surprised to find myself using completely different tools in another five years.

200 posts

The one thing that hasn’t changed is how much I enjoy blogging. I’ve learned so much about myself, met so many great people, and have hopefully been able to help others a little bit, all through my blog. Who knew that such an awful sounding word could turn out to be so great?

Here’s to another 2000 and beyond. Thanks for reading!

Why isn't Twitter dead?

I started using Twitter back in about October of 2006. It had a pretty sizable following by that time, and it has grown quite significantly ever since. I quite like the service, and I’m totally enamored with the idea of microblogging and micromedia in general. And like everyone else, I am frequently annoyed at how often Twitter simply doesn’t work.

Which begs the question – why hasn’t it died? Why do thousands of users like myself keep coming back?

I’m getting really sick of the various messages Twitter displays when it’s down. Too many times I’ve sent text message updates, only to have them never appear or worse, appear days later. Too many times Twitter has stopped sending me updates altogether. Yet despite all the complaining I do, I always find myself back with Twitter as soon as its up.

Why that is, I’m not sure. But I think it may have something to do with the API.

The smartest thing the dudes over at Twitter ever did was make an easy-to-use API, and I bet they didn’t even realize how important it was at the time. It has resulted in dozens and dozens of third party services that build on top of the Twitter community. Positive reinforcement. It’s the API that makes Twitter so versatile, and it’s the API (primarily, I think) that keeps me coming back.

Of course, there’s something to be said about the large, active community that lives at Twitter. Even though in theory it should be simple to hop from service to service on the web, it never happens that way, and the large number of Twitter users certainly exerts a strong gravitational pull. Still, you’d think people would say “enough is enough” after a year and a half of 404 errors and other problems.

But they don’t. Twitter is as popular as ever. I think the API is largely responsible for that.

Use Twitter for Breaking News

Post Image Are you a news junkie? Do you want to be the first to know about things? Look no further than Twitter. Reliability problems aside, it really is the best place to get the latest, breaking news. When the primaries are on in the US, I find out who wins via Twitter, as soon as they are projected. Today I found out about Heath Ledger right away. Increasingly I get my news via Twitter.

The best part about Twitter is that it can follow you anywhere! You can view it on the web, on your mobile Internet device (like the iPod touch), over instant messaging using Google Talk, or on your mobile phone via SMS.

Here are a few Twitter accounts you should consider following for all news:

  • nytimes – the latest headlines from the New York Times
  • bbcworld – the latest headlines from BBC World News
  • cbcnews – the latest headlines from CBC News
  • cnn – the latest headlines from CNN
  • cnnbrk – breaking news only from CNN

In addition to the above, I’ve found the following accounts to be useful for news about the US Election:

  • politics – lots of political news, as you’d expect
  • davewiner – he’s really quick at posting when the networks declare a winner
  • johnedwards – the official Twitter of John Edwards
  • barackobama – the official Twitter of Barack Obama
  • ronpaul2008 – the official Twitter of Ron Paul

Also useful is the Politweets site, which lists the latest messages mentioning the candidates across all Twitter users.

Enjoy!