Apr 30
In a recent survey by Nelson, over 60% of users on Twitter fail to return the following month to the site.
Even though the social networking site has seen an explosion of users in the post Oprah & CNN Vs. Ashton Kutcher events Twitter is still only retaining 40% of it’s users. Before those two events, only 30% of users stayed with the site updating, or “tweeting”, their profile.
The Nelson ratings report also cites that the other two giant social networking websites have retained their users. Both MySpace.com and Facebook.com have both kept 70% of their users after their growth period.
Personal thoughts
What can be causing 6 out of 10 users to drop Twitter? There seem to be a number of people who join social networking sites and then never get involved after the initial grace period. That can be said for any of these sites.
Could it be that on Twitter is hard to find people to “follow”? In my own personal experience I’ve found it hard to find people I know. Other sites suggest people I may know by looking up who my current “friends” are or by allowing me to upload a contact list.
Even though the 140 character micro-blogging is novel, how much longer can stay novel? Some other Twitter-like sites allow me to upload videos, pictures, links, as well as blog how ever long I want. Why can’t Twitter? The more information I share with a site about myself, the better it can do to serve me ads that appeal to me. The more appealing the ad, the closer I am to clicking on the ad and buying the product.
Is Twitter NOT going to be the next big thing? What is the next big thing? No one knows these answers, we just have a lot of questions.
written by tom
Jan 27
A recent explode of a hole in microblogging website Twitter.com shows that users should never use single word passwords.
When subscribing to a new web site you usually think of a word that no one else will think of has to do with you, thinking that they will never guess that a goth girl would choose something like “sunshine” as a password. It’s the people that don’t know you that can get into your accounts as well.
In early January of 2009 Twitter.com was broken into by someone using a brute-force attack to gain access to a administrator of the site. Until the attack, Twitter allowed users to continue trying passwords on account. Other sites will allow a user try to gain access three times and then shut the account down to allow a cool down period. The brute-force attacked used every word in the dictionary until “happiness” worked on the account.
written by tom
Jan 15
Burger King’s latest publicity stunt…and we’re not talking about the Burger King perfume…on Facebook, who sites privacy concerns for it’s reason to close the application called “The Whopper Sacrifice”.
The campaign asked for users of Facebook to drop 10 of their online “freinds” after registering for the application on the social networking site. Once the 10 freinds were dropped the users would be rewarded with a free Whopper sandwich at Burger King.
Since the launch of the application a week ago 233,906 people were removed as friends from 82,771 people. Facebook cites privacy concerns for removing the application for the site. On Facebook users expect some level of privacy, says the social networking site.
Under the “Whopper Sacrifice” dropped friends were notified that they were removed by the hungry users. This is counter to Facebook’s terms of service. Facebook has said they tried to deal with the application’s developers for a solution that did not involve the notofication of users getting dropped.
written by tom
Dec 01
On Sunday Facebook has launched their new “Facebook Connect” service which allows users to share their Facebook page with other online social media sites. The idea of connecting many sites, such as Twitter, Digg, CBS with Facebook may seem like a great idea. Before you make the jump for the sake of convenience use caution.
There are many sites out there that allow you share yourself with others online…Facebook, being one of the biggest. You’ve Twittered yourself into a frenzy, Dugg stories that loved, and wrote reviews on CitySearch. Now imagine with this new feature you’ve connected all of your “identities”.
A future employer can now connect to anyone of these sites to try and find information about you, which they have the means and right to. Remember that bad review of the restaurant you made on CitySearch, it just so happens your asking for a job there and the manager is the one finding out about your online reviews.
There are a lot of cautionary tales out there, some true some not. It is always good to know what you’re getting yourself into. With data now free-flowing from site to site all over the internet it is very easy to find out who you are, what you do, who your freinds are, and how much you hate that restaurant.
written by tom
Oct 30
Yahoo! has been making plans for sometime to allow developers in and help build software based on a the Yahoo! platform.
On Tuesday the “rewiring” will start. Developers will now be able to create applications to work with many of Yahoo!’s current line-up of software, like Mail and Search. New capabilities will be built into the site, like being able to track your “friends” pictures and activities.
Some would say Yahoo! is getting into the game too late. MySpace and Facebook, sites who dominate in social networking, already have millions of users and thousands of developers working off their respective platforms.
Yahoo! does already have a tremedous user base, going back to the days of the site just being a search engine. As long as a user logs into Yahoo! the site can then track how they rated a book or movie or when they add pictures and send that information only to people who the users says is a friend.
Although many companies have similar types of sites that allow people to share photos, ratings of movies, e-mail, etc, Yahoo! hopes to put this all under the same platform, namely Yahoo!. This would help drive traffic to the site, which inturn would help the sale of advertising and other sources of revenue for the company.
picture from http://www.dnjournal.com
written by tom