I have been using Twitter for 12 years and I love it more than ever.
For me, Twitter is not a social network. It’s an interest community. An idea network. More like a protocol. A global conversation protocol.
Twitter the business
I have trouble viewing Twitter as a regular tech company. Of course, I want Twitter the company to be sustainable and profitable. But, Twitter has a history of not being very good at monetization. It looks like this has improved, as Twitter has been profitable for the past 5 quarters.
I might be mistaken (and I hope that I am), but I don’t believe Twitter will ever find a similarly strong business model as Google or Facebook. So while I couldn’t be more excited about Twitter the product, I am not similarly excited about Twitter the business.
The role of Twitter in society
I believe Twitter plays a different role. More one of a protocol and public utility. Twitter enables real-time global conversation, and it does it better than any other tool. Well, not fully global, as Twitter is currently blocked in China, which might never be resolved. But this is a different story.
A decentralized future?
Jack Dorsey, the CEO of Twitter, is also the CEO of Square, a mobile payments company. Both Jack and Square have been experimenting with and supporting Bitcoin for several years.
I have a strong conviction that the world is moving towards decentralization and privacy. Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies are an important catalyst for that. So how could Twitter look like in a decentralized, censorship-resistant world?
It could be similar to Steemit. The central database would be decentralized on a distributed ledger. Created content could not be controlled or censored. It only could be moderated in a limited way on the client layer. There would be multiple clients and user-experiences.
Without a central database, the current business model would be heavily disrupted. There would be no data licensing. And advertising would be harder, as there would be multiple clients.
Conclusion
Is that the future of Twitter? I don’t know. What I do know is that I love Twitter and the work of Jack Dorsey, and I will be watching and continue to cheer from the sidelines.
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This post has been inspired by the recent podcast episodes with Jack Dorsey, which allowed me to take a deep dive:
– Jack Dorsey on Roe Rogan Experience
– Jack Dorsey on Sam Harris
– Jack Dorsey on Tales from the Crypt
– Jack Dorsey on Stephan Livera
