EvanWilliams
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Twitter faces trademark infringement lawsuit from podcast network
TWiT, aka This Week in Tech, is suing Twitter. The well-known tech netcast says Twitter has broken a number of written and oral agreements and is infringing on its trademark. The two companies started up around the same time in the mid-2000s, with Twitter co-founder Evan Williams telling TWiT's Leo Laporte that Twitter was simply a "text-based microblogging service". The two informally agreed that, despite the similarities in their names, their platforms were fundamentally different and were happy to co-exist on the condition, the lawsuit alleges, of "each company continuing its own unique distribution platform." As far as TWiT is concerned, that's no longer the case.
Twitter founders create Branch and Medium to keep the conversations, collections flowing (updated)
If you've ever been so embroiled in a chat or sharing splurge that you've been told to "take it off of Twitter," you now can -- sort of. Twitter co-creators Biz Stone and Ev Williams have launched Branch and Medium, two companion services that (naturally) use a Twitter sign-in but narrow the focus to just a few subjects. As the name suggests, Branch lets especially vocal Twitter users invite others into conversations that don't clutter everyone's feeds or cut replies off at the 140-character limit. Medium? Think of it as Pinterest turned publishing platform: members can publish either a static collection of favorite articles and media, for reading and rating, or leave it open for more collaborative efforts. There's no rush to open the floodgates to the invitation-only portals, though. Stone and Williams see the quietness of their new services as an antidote to the madness of regular social streams, and we can't help but sympathize. Update: The services don't quite work in the way The Guardian originally suggested. Branch lets you invite others into conversations through email, not just Twitter. Medium is really a self-publishing system, not a Pinterest-style sharing service. Also, the Twitter founders were just the most prominent investors in Branch and Medium; they weren't responsible for creating the companies.
Twitter adding 370,000 new users a day, only half of them weight loss spammers
If you weren't out egging cars all weekend, you may have noticed The New York Times profile of former Twitter CEO Evan Williams. Among other things, the article contains some interesting nuggets of information about the service's user base and rate of growth... and let's just say that it's growing. Fast. According to the Times, Twitter is adding nearly 370,000 users per day to its current (as of the writing) user base of 175 million. Yes, that's heading ever closer to the 200 million mark, a truly huge number. No further information was spilled about where those users are coming from and what their level of engagement is (it's been reported that as much as 55% of users never make a single Tweet and that many of them don't follow anybody at all). However, we're pretty sure of one thing: newcomers to Twitter won't have any trouble fitting in if they just stick to talking about food and drink (or dieting, if you want to fit in with the bots). Hit up the source for the full, riveting portrait.
Dick Costolo named new Twitter CEO, Evan Williams to focus on product strategy
To say Evan Williams has had a stellar run at Twitter would be understating things tremendously, but he apparently couldn't take the pressure after watching The Social Network this weekend. All kidding aside, Mr. Williams has decided to step aside and let COO Dick Costolo take over as CEO, while he focuses entirely on "product strategy." It's unclear what exactly Evan will be doing at his new post, nor why he decided to step away from the ultimate limelight, but then again, it's hard to sum up a corner office job description in just 140 characters.
