Twitter and Facebook, both hugely successful social medias and a driving force in today’s society, and the huge role that it plays in connectivity between individuals.
Despite what many may think, the phenomenal of social networking can still be considered to be in its infancy stage. People assume that since these social networking sites are such big and successful companies, one can easily forget that it was just a couple of years ago when these sites first ventured into the infinite space of the Internet. With its current exponential growth, it’ll make a person wonder how big these sites can become 10 years down the road. Or will one take over the other? Or will they co-exist side by side peacefully without hampering each other’s growth and popularity? There are so many questions concerning Twitter and Facebook. Questions that currently can’t be given a straight answer. Because after all, like I said, both companies are still growing. Only time can tell what is the future of these sites. So, right now all we can do is compare and contrast between both sites and just predict which will fare better than the other.
Twitter Pros
· Easy to navigate and update, link to and promote anything
· Reach far beyond your inner circle of friends
· One feed pools all users; anyone can follow anyone else unless blocked
· Pure communication tool, rapid responsiveness
· You don’t have to be logged in to get updates; you can just use an RSS reader
· Very interactive, extensible messaging platform with open APIs
· Many other applications being developed (Twitterific, Summize, Twhirl, etc.)
· Potential SMS text messaging revenue from wireless networks (although Twitter states they are not currently getting any cut)
· Potential future advertising and/or enterprise subscription-based revenue streams
· With its “thin” overhead, Twitter is probably more scalable than Facebook, giving it a cost advantage
Twitter Cons
· Limited functionality; find people, send brief messages, direct replies
· Limited to 140 characters per update
· Not all people find it immediately useful
· Over-emphasis on follower counts
· Easily abused for spam and increasing the noise level
· Relatively smaller installed user base
· As yet no readily apparent monetization strategy
Facebook Pros
· Application mashup; find people, make connections, email, instant messaging, image/video sharing, etc.
· Most people can quickly grasp the value of connecting with friends, family and established contacts; some people report they use Facebook instead of email and IM
· More emphasis on deep connections with others vs. who has the most connections
· “True Friends” feature increases your transparency to selected connections; almost like having private and public profiles
· Huge, rapidly growing installed user base
· Inherit stickiness, third party applications, “gift giving” and personal data collection make Facebook a powerful advertising platform
Facebook Cons
· More difficult to navigate and update
· Requires investment of time to realize sustained benefit
· Opt in model requires a user to allow others to connect
· Less immediate responses; unless you stay logged on continually
· Overhead of mashup and “thick” applications could limit scalability, bloat cost structure
The future of social networking
Looking at all these pros and cons between Twitter and Facebook, while zealots may point to either one as being more superior, the truth is, that these social networking sites has both its disadvantages and advantages. Ultimately these sites are just in its essences communication tools! So depending on how individuals want to broadcast their messages to others, it will depend on which type of medium they prefer to use! Naturally, both will continue to evolve and morph as users find new ways to extract value and either network may or may become a long term winner in the rapidly evolving social networking space. Because at the end of the day, the site that has the better profitable, scalable and sustainable business model than the other, will naturally overcome it’s competitors, just like Google did during the dotcom era.
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