Slightly off topic, does anyone know if the portrayal of Jack Dorsey in Hatching Twitter is accurate?
1. Odeo isn't doing well. 2. We broke into small teams to brainstorm ideas. 3. Jack, one of our devs, had this idea for SMS messaging. 4. Oh, and it also had a web interface. 5. It was quick to build, so here you go (link to twitter). 6. Tell us what you think.
It was, IMHO, incredibly boring at that point, and I didn't use it again for years.
That's my personal recollection of how it was announced. I think history was rewritten a few times maybe?
Edit: Oops, it was NOT doing well. Big difference, sorry.
I see it referenced everywhere, but what exactly where they trying to do, and what worked/didn't work?
It was discovery for podcasts and was destroyed when iTunes included podcasts.
It was an awful flash app that rarely worked. Mostly a good way to freeze your browser.
That said, it was the wild west of podcasting back then, so any discovery was helpful. I remember one of the first podcasts I listened to was just Adam Curry driving around Amsterdam smoking and swearing at people.
It was pretty awesome.
Without his whole-hearted support at Odeo dont think Twitter would have gotten off the ground. We gotta remember Ev founded Blogger, before Twitter, and Medium after. So he certainly has perspectives on how communications + media evolving in the digital era.
Edit: Typos + Syntax!
I don't see anything in the article about the hatching of twitter but you should read more about the accounts from noah glass.