A new report from global public relations firm Weber Shandwick has found that when it comes to Fortune 100 companies, they just don't get Twitter...not yet anyway.
According to the study (PDF), which looked at how the world's 100 top companies used Twitter between late August and early September, the companies have a grand total of 540 Twitter accounts owned by just 73 companies; 27 firms don't participate in the microblogging tool/social network. Some 76 percent of those 540 accounts weren't "updated often" and 52 percent were not actively engaged, as measured by the accounts' use of hash tags, links, references, and retweets.
Weber Shandwick contends that in order for a company to be successful on Twitter, it needs to engage users through five basic activities: listening to followers, participating in conversations, updating accounts frequently, replying to questions, and retweeting useful messages. The PR firm says that if companies perform those activities, they will have a large number of followers. But its research found that 50 percent of Fortune 100 Twitter accounts had fewer than 500 followers.
And companies that had active Twitter accounts weren't making their tweets appealing to followers, the firm found. Fifty-three percent of the accounts did not "display personality, tone, or voice" in their messages. Only one-third of all the researched accounts featured personality "in addition to names and/or photos of those who posted tweets." Seventy-six percent of accounts surveyed posted 500 or fewer tweets on the account. As Weber Shandwick points out, the more tweets of value, the more likely the brand will engage customers.
Big companies aren't doing enough on Twitter.
(Credit: Weber Shandwick)In the end, Weber Shandwick was concerned about company use (or lack of use) of the Twitter. The organization wrote that "for the majority of Fortune 100 companies, Twitter remains a missed opportunity." The firm said "many of their Twitter accounts, examined by Weber Shandwick, did not appear to listen to or engage with their readers, instead offering a one-way broadcast of press releases, company blog posts, and event information."
Weber Shandwick also offered a word of caution. The firm said that "the number of active Twitter users in the United states already exceeds 20 million and can be expected to continue to grow. This is a massive human database to tap; companies that understand the value of Twitter can benefit from its potential as a viable engagement platform."
Don Reisinger is a technology columnist who has written about everything from HDTVs to computers to Flowbee Haircut Systems. Don is a member of the CNET Blog Network, and posts at The Digital Home. He is not an employee of CNET. Disclosure.
As much as Twitter is a powerful communication and social application, it's a relatively simple Web app. As part of a new contest sponsored by Engine Yard, Ruby on Rails developers are going to turn Twitter into their own application server.
The contest asks developers to program the "Worst App Server Technology Ever" (Waste) using Twitter as the message bus. While much of the contest is being done tongue-in-cheek, it's actually an interesting use case to see if a service like Twitter can take the place of a more traditional message bus like IBM MQ series or AMQP (Advanced Message Queuing Protocol).
Contest participants register up to five Twitter handles and code the function that each would perform in a program. When the contest challenge is issued on November 12, participants will have to use at least 10 of the pre-designated Twitter handles (other than their own) as endpoints to perform functions on data sets located at unique URLs. All messages will work through a series of automated public Twitter replies.
This is somewhere between an application server, a social game, the "telephone game" and service-oriented architecture (SOA) where Twitter plays the role of the enterprise service bus and the Twitter API is the broker between data sources. SOA relies on services exposing their functionality other applications and services can read to understand how to utilize those services. In this case, Twitter can be used as an application server in the cloud. (Take that buzzword bingo players.)
The funny thing is that as absurd and comical as this sounded when the Engine Yard guys told me about it, I've started to think about this as a way to possibly achieve a real technological breakthrough. And while I don't think that Twitter will be the "cloud bus," I do think that there is a lot to be learned from applying this type of constraint to a data flow process.
Engine Yard VP of marketing Michael Mullany told me that the contest shows how developers can leverage a relatively straightforward platform in innovative ways. But it's also another example of an interesting marketing effort to use Twitter as the vehicle for one's own benefit. Also, in true open source fashion, developers wind up building new applications based on code written by their peers.
Let's hope Twitter can handle the attention and developers are not greeted by the ever-lurking fail whale. You can check out the contest and learn more details at Engineyard.com
Two of the Web's biggest search giants are making friends with social networks.
Microsoft is bringing real-time search results from Facebook and Twitter to its Bing search engine thanks to two partnerships. The Twitter partnership, which will bring all real-time public tweets to Bing, went live in beta on Wednesday at Bing.com/twitter.
The Facebook deal, which will access all information shared publicly on the social network, will arrive "at a later date," Microsoft said. It's all part of Bing's strategy to harness "the emerging hot area of real-time information."
In a deal announced just hours after Microsoft debuted integration of "tweets" into Bing, Google said it would also be indexing real-time Twitter messages in search results. Google has "reached an agreement," but the search results have not gone live like Microsoft's have on Bing. Reports started to surface earlier this month that Twitter was in separate talks with both Google and Microsoft.
Uncharacteristically for Microsoft, the new Twitter search feature on Bing went live shortly after the announcement. Here's how Twitterized Bing works for users so far.
• Study: Twitter users young, wireless, on other social sites
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• Eight billion minutes spent on Facebook daily
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Windows 7: Microsoft's touchy-feely launch
A subdued launch left enthusiasts with plenty of time to get hands-on with all the new PCs--well, all but that Dell Adamo that everyone wanted to get their hands on.• Windows 7 born from Vista's frustrations
• Windows 7 default user account control worries experts
• Windows 7 security in pictures
• Microsoft's Windows 7 launch: Deals, deals, deals
• HP, Best Buy team on Windows 7 'home makeover'
• CNET's Windows 7 coverage
Apple unveils redesigned MacBooks, new iMacs
Apple revamped its desktop and laptop lines, dramatically redesigning the iMac all-in-one and MacBook laptop, and also adding a few updates to its Mac Mini line of small-scale desktops.• Apple: Best Mac, iPhone quarterly sales ever
Barnes & Noble debuts its Nook
The bookseller launches its Kindle rival at an event at the Chelsea Piers. As expected, the e-reader has a dual-screen display and will sell for $259.• Is Barnes & Noble's Nook a Kindle killer?
• Internet Archive's BookServer could 'dominate' Amazon
FCC sets Internet regulation in motion
Federal Communications Commission votes unanimously to gather data that will be used to determine regulations to keep the Net open.• Telco lobbyists don't mind some Net neutrality regs
• AT&T enlists employees to oppose Net neutrality
• Verizon CEO slams Net neutrality
• Google, Verizon Wireless find common ground on Net neutrality
• Net neutrality still faces political, legal hurdles
Another Facebook redesign: Birthdays are important
Leaked document shows some of Facebook's plan for a minor home page redesign that addresses some of the concerns members raised the last time the company did a big design overhaul.• Facebook COO: No PayPal killer, ad network--yet
• Facebook's Gift Shop gets down to business
News Corp. digital chief: MySpace 'kind of stopped'
As the social site attempts a turnaround, the parent company's chief digital officer talked about how it lost its way. Whether it'll be able to get back on top is less clear.• MySpace blasts out new music features
• MySpace takes one small step in the right direction
Utilities vow to prep infrastructure for plug-in cars
Utilities say they need to invest in infrastructure to ease the transition of plug-in electric vehicles with incentives for off-peak charging and charging stations in public places.• Investor: Green tech vital to U.S. competitiveness
• Toyota looks to electric car business
Also of note
• Nokia sues Apple over wireless patents
• France adopts antipiracy three-strikes law
• Judge: Craigslist not liable for prostitution ads
The tech world is all too familiar with Twitter's "fail whale" and have become accustomed to Gmail failures (which are inevitably chronicled on Twitter.) And while sometimes it's infrastructure (such as routers and switches) rather than software that fails, it often seems as if we too readily accept that software will inevitably breakdown.
Mark Donsky, director of product management at Coverity, commented recently about a recent static analysis of open-source projects performed on the Scan site that showed a 71.9 percent correlation between the number of lines of code and number of defects found.
This is of course, not an open-source problem but a general issue that occurs as more code is integrated into products. I've been told that Windows is developed with two quality assurance people to every engineer as the product has grown over the years.
Coverity is focused on software integrity and advocates static analysis early in the development cycle. While testing of all kinds, including static analysis are obviously good ideas, the tools and methods vary dramatically by engineering organization. The Software Engineering Institute (SEI) at Carnegie Mellon University and the Object Management Group (OMG) recently paired up to form a consortium to establish standards for software quality.
... Read moreSocial media site Twitter wasn't always friendly to users this week.
The microblogging tool was inaccessible for several hours on Thursday morning, followed by a period of slowness and sporadic time-outs (and more outright downtime). Twitter blamed an "ongoing" denial-of-service attack, but initially had little more to say. Social-networking site Facebook has also confirmed that it was targeted by a DoS attack that rendered some of its features slow or nonfunctional.
The denial-of-service attack was apparently the result of a coordinated attack on a Russian activist blogger with accounts on Twitter, Facebook, LiveJournal, Google's Blogger, and YouTube. The pro-Georgian blogger, who uses the account name "Cyxymu," had accounts on all of the different sites that were attacked at the same time, Max Kelly, chief security officer at Facebook, told CNET News.
"It was a simultaneous attack across a number of properties targeting him to keep his voice from being heard," Kelly said. "We're actively investigating the source of the attacks and we hope to be able to find out the individuals involved in the back end and to take action against them if we can."
But Twitter's problems go beyond Internet attacks. In what might seem to some like a concerted assault by the forces of tradition on social media, the Marines and certain NFL teams have reportedly banned Twitter and Facebook.
A Marine Corps order has made the Corps' feelings known with characteristic subtlety: "These Internet sites in general are a proven haven for malicious actors and content and are particularly high risk due to information exposure, user-generated content, and targeting by adversaries."
NFL teams are also letting players know that they will be offsides if they tweet. At the beginning of training camp, Green Bay Packers players were apparently told that they would be fined $1,701 (the NFL maximum) for texting or tweeting during a team function. The Miami Dolphins do have their own Twitter page, but coach Tony Sparano told players to lay off the tweets in order not to create additional distractions.
ESPN employees will also apparently be out of bounds if they post any sports-related content on social-networking tools such as Twitter and Facebook without its permission. The news first came to light Tuesday when Ric Bucher, an NBA analyst for ESPN, tweeted that he had just received an network memo regarding tweeting:
The hammer just came down, tweeps: ESPN memo prohibiting tweeting info unless it serves ESPN. Kinda figured with was coming.
"Personal Web sites and blogs that contain sports content are not permitted," according to the memo. But, it says, "If ESPN.com opts not to post sports related social media content created by ESPN talent, you are not permitted to report, speculate, discuss or give any opinions on sports related topics or personalities on your personal platforms(.)"
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iPhone grabs 32 percent of smartphone profit
Despite only having only having an 8 percent share in the smartphone market, Apple walked away with 32 percent of the profits for the industry.
• Is a $99 iPhone 3GS coming soon?
Hanging with hackers can make you paranoid
Compromised ATMs, virus-infected USB drives, badges with built-in microphones and security experts getting hacked--no wonder it's scary going to Black Hat and Defcon.• Hacking the Defcon badges
• Defcon: What to leave at home and other do's and don'ts
Google launches Chrome gallery
Google publishes a collection of 29 skins to customize its browser's appearance. Mozilla, meanwhile, boasts it has more than 20,000.• New Chrome beta reflects bigger Google challenge
• Chrome gives Google bookmark sync religion again
Mac OS X 10.5.8 update is out
A new batch of fixes improves security, Bluetooth compatibility, connection issues with AirPort networks, and increases RAW image support.• Apple fixes hole with Mac OS X image viewing
• New Firefox patches authentication security holes
• Apple censors a dictionary app
San Diego to test mobile electric-car charger
How do you charge your electric car while on the go? San Diego Gas & Electric will test device that allows drivers to charge car battery and have usage added to their bill.• Tires to match your cellulosic ethanol?
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• Yahoo has escape clause in Microsoft search deal
• Online ad spending down again
• Reflecting on the DTV transition
Microsoft is moving into Apple's territory and is making no secret of its target.
The software giant announced plans to open its first stores this fall, with at least some of the locations likely to be right near an Apple store. The fall timing is not surprising. One would assume that Microsoft would want to have the stores open in time for Windows 7's October 22 retail launch and for the holiday selling season.
Speaking at the Worldwide Partner Conference in New Orleans, Microsoft Chief Operating Officer Kevin Turner told people to "stay tuned" for more news on the retail front.
"And stay tuned, because we're going to have some retail stores opened up that are opened up right next door to Apple stores this fall," he said. "Stay tuned, just stay tuned."
It should come as no surprise that Apple isn't a big fan of Microsoft's "Laptop Hunters" ads, but some may be surprised to learn that the Mac maker's lawyers reportedly called a senior Microsoft executive and demanded that the ads be removed.
The most intriguing part of Turner's speech was when he recounted a telephone call he says he got from Apple's legal department, demanding that Microsoft remove the ads.
According to Turner, "two weeks ago, we got a call from the Apple legal department, saying, hey--this is a true story--saying, 'Hey, you need to stop running those ads; we lowered our prices.' They took like $100 off or something. It was the greatest single phone call in the history that I've ever taken in business.
Microsoft also announced how much it will charge companies that want to use its Windows Azure cloud-computing service when it is released in final form this fall. The software maker announced a variety of plans, including one that charges purely on consumption and another that offers discounted rates for those that agree to a six-month commitment.
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Lessons from Twitter's security breach
Information taken from the hacking of some of Twitter's employees a few months ago is finally coming to light. Can this happen to other companies?• Google lawyer heads to Twitter
Facebook hits a quarter billion users
The social network isn't doing anything fancy to celebrate, other than working to develop odds and ends such as "new mobile products."• Facebook's valuation: The cheat sheet
• Facebook calls for payment platform testers
Bing claims 8 percent rise in users during June
Microsoft's relaunched search engine attracted 8 percent more unique users in June, according to the company's data.• Report: Bing adding little to Microsoft ad dollars so far
Google has itself 'a very good quarter'
Revenue rises 3 percent to top $4 billion as online-ad spending avoids a downward spiral amid an economy still looking for signs of recovery.• Intel posts loss on EU fine, but upbeat on rest of '09
• Nokia sees bottom to mobile market malaise
PC market improvement on the horizon
For the second straight quarter, shipment growth was negative, but not as bad as initially expected.• Dell poised to benefit most from PC market recovery
Sun shareholders approve Oracle merger
Investors OK the $7.4 billion deal, but acquisition still faces scrutiny by the Justice Department. Java licensing said to be the sticking point.
Music industry wants cut of Pirate Bay sale
Music industry's international enforcement arm says it plans to collect money from four Pirate Bay operators. A sale indicates that the four have cash.• Pirate Bay exec no longer compares RIAA to Stalin
Apple breaks up Palm Pre-iTunes lovefest
With the release of iTunes 8.2.1, Apple puts a stop to the Palm Pre, iTunes synchronization.• Why can't Palm follow Zune's lead?
Bill Gates offers the world a physics lesson
In an interview with CNET News, Gates talks about why he spent his own money to make a series of classic physics lectures available free on the Web. He also touches on Project Natal, Google's Chrome OS and more.• Bill Gates on Google's Chrome OS
• Gates: Natal to bring gesture recognition to Windows too
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• Researchers: Attacks on U.S., Korea sites came from U.K.
• ExxonMobil to make fuel from algae
• Patent Office rejects Rambus claims against Nvidia
As a follow-up to its free, 50-user microblogging product, Socialtext is launching a new paid service for large to enterprise-sized companies that lets them run the Twitter-like service behind the firewall, and with many more users.
Companies that want it can pay $1 per user, per month, alongside a monthly fee that pays for Socialtext's server appliance. This hardware runs the microblogging software locally, and can be connected to a company's backup systems for if something goes wrong, although it makes nightly backups of its own. The appliance fee also covers monthly software updates that will fix bugs and add new features.
In a call with CNET News on Monday, Ross Mayfield who is Socialtext's chairman, president, and co-founder, said that the benefits of having a system like this locally can make a big difference when doing a fresh setup on a big company. "You turn it on, and in five minutes you can start posting right away."
Your company 'tweets' would go through this box.
(Credit: Socialtext)To speed things up, the appliance can be connected to local staff directories and pull in employee information to create user accounts that have profile information including phone numbers and e-mail address already filled out. Anytime local directory changes are made, this information gets updated in Socialtext too. Administrative control is also not limited to IT staff, since certain users can be graced with admin privileges of their own that let them moderate both user content and the users themselves.
Companies will still be able to use Socialtext's free 50-user version of the service that lives in the cloud, but this option gives larger companies a bigger user cap and more control over the data. Mayfield also pushed the fact that companies that wanted to tack on additional Socialtext services won't have to get any additional hardware since they'll already have it for this service.
Socialtext is undercutting competitors like Yammer in price, as well as offering an additional way to deliver its service. Yammer has its own Web based service for enterprise power users, however it's a little more pricey at $3-5 per user, per month (depending on what plan they go for). There is, however, no hardware to buy. On the flip side, Socialtext's solution can still be used even if access to the outside world is blocked, which can often be the best time to find out what your employees are up to.
Twitter made its case this week that it's up to the task of being a player in geopolitical journalism.
The Iranian government, which is attempting to control the flow of information among protesters of the supposed results of that nation's presidential election, is having difficulty stopping citizens from using technology to report what's happening, express outrage, and get people out to opposition rallies.
Twitter users are urging each other to change their location settings to confuse censors in Iran.
(Credit: Twitter)Because the U.S. has no diplomatic relations with Iran, information gathered on the Web is crucial to its understanding of the post-election unrest that has led to mass protests and fatal clashes with police. Twitter, where users have been filtering relevant information with the hashtag #iranelection, has been a crucial hot spot for raw news.
Twitter even rescheduled some planned downtime in order to stay accessible for Iranian users in the midst of political upheaval at the request of the U.S. Department of State. The diplomacy agency is working with multiple social-networking and communication services to ensure that conversation and information channels stay active.
One technique being employed to get around the government's online blockades is the electronic equivalent of a detour, which involves using something known as a proxy server.
Normally, a Web browser makes a connection directly to a Web site's Internet address. But that address can be easily discovered and added to the government's blacklist. The trick is to redirect Web browsing through a proxy, which could be a permanent commercial service, or someone volunteering his or her computer temporarily.
Worried that the Iranian government might seek out and punish any Twitter users who were employing the microblogging site for potentially subversive purposes, Twitterers are encouraging others to change their stated country of origin. Certainly, the Iranian government knows how to use Twitter and how to find people in that country using the microblogging service as a way to spread news about the protests.
The easiest way the Iranian government could discover which tweets were from Iranians is to look at whose accounts are registered to people who identify themselves as being from that country. A new thread that spread quickly across Twitter urged people around the world to change those settings in order to make themselves appear to be in Tehran.
• With Iran crisis, Twitter's youth is over
• State Department comments on 'talks' with Twitter
• '#CNNFail': Twitterverse slams network's Iran absence
• Google, Facebook rush Iranian language support
More headlines
iPhone 3G S debuts
It doesn't offer quite the same leap that the iPhone 3G offered over the first model, but the latest Apple handset still is a compelling upgrade for some users.• iPhone 3G S begins shipping to customers
• Analyst expects 500,000 iPhones sold this weekend
• AT&T loosens its iPhone 3G S upgrade policy
• Microsoft: No iPhone reimbursements for workers
• Full coverage: Apple iPhone
• iPhone OS 3.0 now available
Scattered reports of iPhone OS 3.0 update problems
Most iPhone and iPod Touch users say they've had success in updating their devices with the new operating system, but a smattering have hit roadblocks.• Some apps have age restriction warnings in iPhone OS 3.0
• iPhone 3.0 a cut-and-paste win for Twitter
The day after the DTV transition
The DTV transition has come and gone, and the world did not end. But FCC officials say their work will continue to make sure that no one is left behind.• Good-bye, rabbit ears? Not so fast
Google's digital-book future hangs in the balance
Google Book Search has the potential to unlock the musty archives of the world's libraries. But will it overcome antitrust obstacles and other opposition?• Bezos: We've got issues with Google Book Search
• Google Book Search gets a face-lift
Apple warns about unsupported players' iTunes integration
A support article appeared on Apple's site Tuesday warning about unsupported third-party digital-media players.• Palm responds to Apple's warning
Will new browsers really upgrade the Web?
The latest browsers sport many hot new features. But the avant-garde must reckon with inconsistent standards, lagging IE, and slow adoption.• Firefox 3.5 'Web upgrade' planned for end of June
• Mozilla pushes Firefox 3.5 RC to beta testers
• Google: We want Chrome to grow the Web
• Opera tries to Unite users across browsers
Also of note
• AMD, Congo, and the perils of code names
• Microsoft gives up YouTube chase
• Court orders Jammie Thomas to pay RIAA $1.92 million
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