Many of us monitoring social media are now deeply entrenched in Twitter. It’s taken me just a few weeks to become addicted. How about you?
Regardless of how you use it – and how often – you can clearly tell from the recent noise on the Web that each month is bringing thousands more people to Twitter.
In fact, according to Compete.com, two million people used Twitter in July, up from nearly 500,000 just a few months ago in January. If you’re new to Twitter, you’re clearly not alone.
For now, the service is free. I say for now, because you just never know, right? YouTube is still free. Facebook is still free. These here and now tech wonders have figured out how to make money from ads, without charging their dedicated users. Will Twitter follow the same model? An article in the new issue of Fortune presents some interesting clues about Twitter’s future.
But think about it, any effort to charge people for their meaningless “I just had a bagel” posts will result in a huge backlash won’t it? Yet, your cell phone provider charges you for text messages don’t they? This will be interesting to watch. Right now, I don’t think I’d stay with it if I was charged a monthly fee to use it.
I think they should just build up a home page that we have to see when we log in, that forces our eyeballs to see a few ads on it every day at the same time we’re reading and sending Tweets on the Web. I could stomach that. Anything but a cost-per-Tweet model works for me.
By the way, if you’re new to Twitter, or still fairly new like me, check out what Shel Israel has to say with his recent post, ”7 tips for new Twitter users.”
