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The rise and fall of Twitter as a platform: 12 graphs

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  The rise and fall of Twitter as a platform: 12 graphs RS Wood <rsw@therandymon.com> - 2014-03-31 16:34 +0000
    Re: The rise and fall of Twitter as a platform: 12 graphs Tim Watts <tw_usenet@dionic.net> - 2014-03-31 17:55 +0100
    Re: The rise and fall of Twitter as a platform: 12 graphs Alan Ralph <usenet@alanralph.co.uk> - 2014-03-31 21:25 +0100
      Re: The rise and fall of Twitter as a platform: 12 graphs Paul Sture <nospam@sture.ch> - 2014-04-01 00:32 +0200
    Re: The rise and fall of Twitter as a platform: 12 graphs Huge <Huge@nowhere.much.invalid> - 2014-04-02 09:05 +0000
      Re: The rise and fall of Twitter as a platform: 12 graphs RS Wood <rsw@therandymon.com> - 2014-04-03 21:51 +0000
        Re: The rise and fall of Twitter as a platform: 12 graphs Huge <Huge@nowhere.much.invalid> - 2014-04-04 10:20 +0000
          Re: The rise and fall of Twitter as a platform: 12 graphs Oregonian Haruspex <bob_davis_retired@yahoo.com> - 2014-04-05 07:29 +0000

#2170 — The rise and fall of Twitter as a platform: 12 graphs

Very interesting article over at the Atlantic:

http://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2014/03/how-twitter-has-changed-over-the-years-in-12-charts/359869/

//---- clip
The average active user tweets about 20 times per month. That number
grew a lot from (roughly) 2009 to early 2012, but then it leveled off
and began to fall.

Retweeting is up; replying is down. Retweets became more frequent than
replies in late 2013. (Oh, and "old-style" retweets are dead.)

About 55 percent of tweets contain a mention of another user. Only 10
to 15 percent contain a link. Same goes for hashtags. (But people who
hashtag usually add more than one.) 

More than 50 percent of Tweets come from mobile devices. Desktop usage
of all types continues to decline.

Only 30 percent of Twitter's users are located in the U.S. and Canada.

But English remains the most popular language, by far. Spanish is a
distant second.

More than 30 percent of accounts are inactive. The number of inactive
and suspended accounts has been growing rapidly over the last several
years. 

Roughly 10-15 percent of tweets from 2009-2010 are now unavailable
because people have deleted them or made their accounts private (or the
account was suspended).

People don't change their handles very often.

//----end clip

The last bullet is obviously because they had trouble coming up with a
tenth, interesting point.  The others are interesting.  The switch to
retweets and the incessant hashtagging says to me Twitter as a
conversation platform has plateaued, probably because it's not great
for conversation unless you like short, choppy attacks.  It also says
to me a lot of people tried it for a while and then lost interest as
the novelty wore thin.

I conclude that this, too, shall pass.

-- 
RS Wood <rsw@therandymon.com>

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#2172

On 31/03/14 17:34, RS Wood wrote:
> Very interesting article over at the Atlantic:
>
> http://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2014/03/how-twitter-has-changed-over-the-years-in-12-charts/359869/

Yep.

Tweets are too short (who cares about SMS).

Anything worth say will be lost in the noise.

You can't build sophisticated filters to direct useful stuff to your eyes.

Retweets as a concept are totally broken - specifically - yes, retweet 
to your followers - but the fact that about 90% of any stream is just 
the same factoid retweeted often without any additional content is just 
bloody annoying.

Twitter has some niche uses - mostly when something extraordinary 
happens, eg disaster, infrastructure problem or revolution.

The rest of the time it's just a load of old bollocks :)

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#2184

On 31/03/2014 17:34, RS Wood wrote:
> Very interesting article over at the Atlantic:
>
> http://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2014/03/how-twitter-has-changed-over-the-years-in-12-charts/359869/
>
[...]
>
> The last bullet is obviously because they had trouble coming up with a
> tenth, interesting point.  The others are interesting.  The switch to
> retweets and the incessant hashtagging says to me Twitter as a
> conversation platform has plateaued, probably because it's not great
> for conversation unless you like short, choppy attacks.  It also says
> to me a lot of people tried it for a while and then lost interest as
> the novelty wore thin.

I tried Twitter for a while back in 2009, but eventually dropped it 
after 6 months because it was too much of a time-sink. I rejoined in 
2012, mainly to see if it had improved. About the only good thing I can 
say about current Twitter is that you can cut down the noise level 
greatly by turning off retweets from the most voluminous of those you 
follow. (Or perhaps reevaluating why you're following them.) And where 
you do find good conversation, it's a little easier to follow. But the 
shortness of messages, and the sheer number of them, make trying to keep 
up an impossible task. So I no longer bother - I'll just skim the last 
few hours of Twitter in the morning and evening, and call it a day.

Alan

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#2185

On 2014-03-31, Alan Ralph <usenet@alanralph.co.uk> wrote:
> On 31/03/2014 17:34, RS Wood wrote:
>> Very interesting article over at the Atlantic:
>>
>> http://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2014/03/how-twitter-has-changed-over-the-years-in-12-charts/359869/
>>
> [...]
>>
>> The last bullet is obviously because they had trouble coming up with a
>> tenth, interesting point.  The others are interesting.  The switch to
>> retweets and the incessant hashtagging says to me Twitter as a
>> conversation platform has plateaued, probably because it's not great
>> for conversation unless you like short, choppy attacks.  It also says
>> to me a lot of people tried it for a while and then lost interest as
>> the novelty wore thin.

On the English/Spanish bit, in my part of the world German is used a lot.
This is useful to me as a vocabulary builder.

> I tried Twitter for a while back in 2009, but eventually dropped it 
> after 6 months because it was too much of a time-sink. I rejoined in 
> 2012, mainly to see if it had improved. About the only good thing I can 
> say about current Twitter is that you can cut down the noise level 
> greatly by turning off retweets from the most voluminous of those you 
> follow. (Or perhaps reevaluating why you're following them.) And where 
> you do find good conversation, it's a little easier to follow. But the 
> shortness of messages, and the sheer number of them, make trying to keep 
> up an impossible task. So I no longer bother - I'll just skim the last 
> few hours of Twitter in the morning and evening, and call it a day.

I started with Twitter in 2010 with the aim of not letting it become a time
sink by being selective.  Those I do follow generally have something to say
and more often than not include a link to an article of interest, but they
don't tweet every day - more like once or twice a month.

@climagic has some good Linux CLI one liners on a daily basis.  This one from
28th March introduced me to the pv utility:

curl -s http://artscene.textfiles\.com/vt100/globe.vt | pv -L9600 -q 
# Spinning ASCII art globe.

-- 
Paul Sture

"In that case," said Napoleon, "let us wait twenty minutes; when the enemy
is making a false movement we must take good care not to interrupt him."

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#2204

On 2014-03-31, RS Wood <rsw@therandymon.com> wrote:
>
> I conclude that this, too, shall pass.
>

"My name is Ozymandias, king of kings:
Look on my works, ye Mighty, and despair!"
Nothing beside remains. Round the decay
Of that colossal wreck, boundless and bare
The lone and level sands stretch far away."

Percy Bysshe Shelley (1792–1822).

-- 
Today is Boomtime, the 19th day of Discord in the YOLD 3180
“Stupidity cannot be cured. Stupidity is the only universal capital crime;
 the sentence is death. There is no appeal, and execution is carried out
                 automatically and without pity.”

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#2246

Huge <Huge@nowhere.much.invalid> Wrote in message:
> On 2014-03-31, RS Wood <rsw@therandymon.com> wrote:
>>
>> I conclude that this, too, shall pass.
>>
> 
> "My name is Ozymandias, king of kings:
> Look on my works, ye Mighty, and despair!"
> Nothing beside remains. Round the decay
> Of that colossal wreck, boundless and bare
> The lone and level sands stretch far away."
> 
> Percy Bysshe Shelley (1792–1822).

Twitter version:

@ozymandias RT checkit suxx works gone. BG wreck so far, only sand
 left 2 C. IM still king tho amirite?  http://too.gl?xzanchbullshit

:) happy weekend, all.  (Did Shelley really only live to the age
 of 30?  Wow.)

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#2247

On 2014-04-03, RS Wood <rsw@therandymon.com> wrote:
> Huge <Huge@nowhere.much.invalid> Wrote in message:
>> On 2014-03-31, RS Wood <rsw@therandymon.com> wrote:
>>>
>>> I conclude that this, too, shall pass.
>>>
>> 
>> "My name is Ozymandias, king of kings:
>> Look on my works, ye Mighty, and despair!"
>> Nothing beside remains. Round the decay
>> Of that colossal wreck, boundless and bare
>> The lone and level sands stretch far away."
>> 
>> Percy Bysshe Shelley (1792–1822).
>
> Twitter version:
>
> @ozymandias RT checkit suxx works gone. BG wreck so far, only sand
>  left 2 C. IM still king tho amirite?  http://too.gl?xzanchbullshit

LOL

>
>:) happy weekend, all.  (Did Shelley really only live to the age
>  of 30?  Wow.)

Drowned.


-- 
Today is Prickle-Prickle, the 21st day of Discord in the YOLD 3180
“Stupidity cannot be cured. Stupidity is the only universal capital crime;
 the sentence is death. There is no appeal, and execution is carried out
                 automatically and without pity.”

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#2260

Huge <Huge@nowhere.much.invalid> wrote:
> On 2014-04-03, RS Wood <rsw@therandymon.com> wrote:
>> Huge <Huge@nowhere.much.invalid> Wrote in message:
>>> On 2014-03-31, RS Wood <rsw@therandymon.com> wrote:
>>>> 
>>>> I conclude that this, too, shall pass.
>>>> 
>>> 
>>> "My name is Ozymandias, king of kings:
>>> Look on my works, ye Mighty, and despair!"
>>> Nothing beside remains. Round the decay
>>> Of that colossal wreck, boundless and bare
>>> The lone and level sands stretch far away."
>>> 
>>> Percy Bysshe Shelley (1792–1822).
>> 
>> Twitter version:
>> 
>> @ozymandias RT checkit suxx works gone. BG wreck so far, only sand
>>  left 2 C. IM still king tho amirite?  http://too.gl?xzanchbullshit
> 
> LOL
> 
>> 
>> :) happy weekend, all.  (Did Shelley really only live to the age
>>  of 30?  Wow.)
> 
> Drowned.
> 


Shelley and Burns, the greatest of the poets seemed to die early.

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