Posts Tagged ‘Carolyn Penner’

Add two more languages to the list of those supported by Twitter: Russian and Turkish.

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Twitter encouraged use of the secure HTTPS protocol in a post on the Twitter Blog by Carolyn Penner, which announced the ability for users to change their settings to “Always use HTTPS.” Highlights:

For some time, users have been able to use Twitter via HTTPS by going to https://twitter.com. We’ve made it simpler for users to do this by adding the option to always use HTTPS.

To turn on HTTPS, go to your settings and check the box next to “Always use HTTPS,” which is at the bottom of the page. This will improve the security of your account and better protect your information if you’re using Twitter over an unsecured Internet connection, like a public WiFi network, where someone may be able to eavesdrop on your site activity. In the future, we hope to make HTTPS the default setting.

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Twitter marked the five-year anniversary of its first Tweet, sent by co-founder Jack Dorsey March 21, 2006, with a blog post by Carolyn Penner highlighting important Twitter numbers besides 140:

Five years ago this week, a small team of people started working on a prototype of the service that we now know as Twitter. On March 21, 2006, Jack Dorsey (@jack) sent the first Tweet.

Today, on every measure of growth and engagement, Twitter is growing at a record pace. Here are some numbers:

#tweets

3 years, 2 months and 1 day: The time it took from the first Tweet to the billionth Tweet.

1 week: The time it now takes for users to send 1 billion Tweets.

50 million: The average number of Tweets people sent per day, one year ago.

140 million: The average number of Tweets people sent per day, in the past month.

177 million: Tweets sent March 11, 2011.

456: Tweets per second (TPS) when Michael Jackson died June 25, 2009 (a record at that time).

6,939: Current TPS record, set four seconds after midnight in Japan on New Year’s Day.

#accounts

572,000: Number of new accounts created March 12, 2011.

460,000: Average number of new accounts per day over the past month.

182 percent: Increase in number of mobile users over the past year.

#employees

8, 29, 130, 350, 400: Number of Twitter employees in January 2008, January 2009, January 2010, January 2011, and today.

Twitter dipped into the question-and-answer arena, announcing its purchase of Fluther, which describes itself as “a free Q&A collective that specializes in getting fast answers from the right people.”

Fluther co-founder and CEO Ben Finkel, co-founder and president Andrew McClain, lead architect Tim Trueman, and staffers Richard Henry and Cameron Dutro will join Twitter.

Carolyn Penner from Twitter communications wrote on the Twitter Blog:

Today, we’re adding four engineers and one designer through our acquisition of the team at Fluther Inc. During our conversations with Fluther’s team, we were continually impressed by their technical talent, entrepreneurial spirit, and much of the thinking behind the question-and-answer product they’ve spent the last couple of years building.

When the Fluther team joins us, they will focus on helping users discover the most relevant content on Twitter. Their product, Fluther.com, is not part of the acquisition and will remain separate from Twitter.

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With the controversy over WikiLeaks dominating the news for the past couple of weeks, many people have questioned how hashtags like #wikileaks and #cablegate are not showing up on Twitter Trends. Twitter claims it has done nothing to block any WikiLeaks-related hashtags, with Carolyn Penner from Twitter’s public-relations department writing on the Twitter Blog:

Since Twitter first introduced the Trends feature in the summer of 2008, one frequently asked question has been “Why isn’t X trending?” This question has come up around a variety of subjects, from #justinbieber and #adamlambert to #flotilla, #iranelection, and #demo2010.

This week, people are wondering about WikiLeaks, with some asking if Twitter has blocked #wikileaks, #cablegate, or other related topics from appearing in the list of top Trends.

The answer: Absolutely not. In fact, some of these terms, including #wikileaks and #cablegate, have previously trended either worldwide or in specific locations.

Sometimes a topic doesn’t break into the Trends list because its popularity isn’t as widespread as people believe. And sometimes, popular terms don’t make the Trends list because the velocity of conversation isn’t increasing quickly enough, relative to the baseline level of conversation happening on an average day; this is what happened with #wikileaks this week.

The 2010-11 National Basketball Association season tips off with three games Tuesday night, and Twitter is ready to suit up, with Carolyn Penner from the social network’s communications department penning a blog post to remind users that all 30 NBA teams are on Twitter, along with several superstars. Penner wrote:

Now that the free-agency dust has settled and the first @NBA games are happening tonight, it’s time to see how the 2010-11 season will unfold. Will the #lebrondecision to join @chrisbosh and @dwadeofficial on the @MiamiHeat be the right one? Will the @Lakers repeat as world champions? While we don’t have those answers for you, we do have some tips on how to stay up-to-date on the last NBA news.

While the games will be happening offline, the conversations around the game and among players will be happening online on Twitter. Whether or not you can make it to the game, you can be part of the action. All 30 teams are on Twitter, as are many of the superstars in the league: @kingjames, @the_real_nash, @carmeloanthony, and @kdthunderup, among others.

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All Twitter users now have access to the recently redesigned Twitter.com, according to a post on the Twitter Blog by Carolyn Penner of the microblogging site’s communications team, who wrote:

As of today, everyone who uses Twitter now has access to the new Twitter. Whether you’re just signing up today or you’ve been a user for years, this new experience is finally real for everyone — all 160 million of you — and in six languages to boot.

Since we announced the new Twitter four weeks ago, we’ve closely watched Tweets and user comments. We’ve received lots of great feedback that will help as we continue to make Twitter.com even better.

So while we still (and will always) have plenty of work to do, we’re pleased with the positive reaction so far. People are telling us that they love that we’ve kept the timeline simple, while also providing a richer experience through the details pane. You can now dive deeper into a Tweet and see more details, like recent replies, the bios of other accounts mentioned in it, and photos and videos from media partners like Flickr, YouTube, Ustream, and yfrog. Watch this explanatory video to learn more about how to get the most of out of new Twitter. (Or, if you prefer a hip-hop version, check out the fan video that @iamwill and team created.)

The inevitable finally happened, according to data from comScore, Twitter bypassed MySpace to become the world’s No. 3 social-networking-type online service, The Wall Street Journal‘s Digits reported.

Facebook topped the list for August, with 598 million unique visitors, followed by Microsoft’s Windows Live Profile, which integrates with the company’s Web-based email and other services, at more than 140 million, Digits reported.

Twitter tallied 96 million unique visitors in August, up 76 percent versus August 2009, while MySpace totaled 95 million, down 17 percent from the year-earlier period, Digits added.

MySpace spokeswoman Rosabel Tao told Digits:

Any comparisons between MySpace and other Internet services are irrelevant, as MySpace’s mix of offerings is uniquely different and specifically focused on audiences under the age of 35.

Twitter spokeswoman Carolyn Penner told Digits:

While we generally don’t comment on third-party statistics, the growth measured by others doesn’t surprise us. We’re seeing 370,000 new accounts a day.