Facebook Slowly Adding Twitter-Like Features, Following Microsoft's Model

Business Insider:

Last fall, Facebook tried and failed to acquire Twitter for $500 million in Facebook stock.

The deal blew up when Twitter learned Facebook valued itself somewhere around $8 billion while its stock was going for closer to $4 billion on the market.

So what has Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg done since?

He has followed the model set by his tech business hero, fellow Harvard dropout and Microsoft cofounder Bill Gates.

Throughout his career at Microsoft, when Bill Gates came up against a rival with an impressive product, his standard move was to dedicate Microsoft's resources toward coming out with a Microsoft version of the product. Microsoft would then refine that version--and, ultimately, in many cases, build a better one--while slowly but surely driving the innovator's product into irrelevance.

It was a method that drove Gates's rivals mad. Larry Ellison once blew up at a reporter who asked about Microsoft innovations, telling the reporter:

"What's new is nothing new. Microsoft continues to do what they always do which is to keep the price of Windows high and copy other people's software and just add it to Windows. That is the absolute opposite of innovation."

But Gates wasn't in business for his rivals benefit and neither is Mark Zuckerberg. And so, since the Twitter deal died, Facebook has bit by bit taken on Twitter-like features as its own.

Click through to see 10 ways Facebook is copying Twitter >

Read the whole story: Business Insider

Comments

[imsosure]

09:39 PM on 06/30/2009

Don't really care for either one, call me old fashioned but if you want to reach me either call , send a letter or try emailing me. The rest of this stuff is for kids, little toys where they are inevitably exposing all kinds of personal information they wouldn't ordinarily tell anyone and certainly not perfect strangers. But it's cutesy that they expose themselves to all kinds of information pirating that those who would want it would be willing to wait to use years before they strike. It may sound paranoid but we'll see, there's already people getting emailing lists from all over the world, I'll bet most if not all of you have been the winner of some lottery or offered to launder money or any number of other illicit email scams.

[zizizzi]

12:13 PM on 06/30/2009

I recently joined facebook and I don't like it very much.
My friend invited me so we could share pictures of our grandkids.
It's too busy and gimmicky.

I thought twitter was a place for frustrated republicans to spout their talking points.
They only talk in sound bites, can't spell very well or form cohesive sentences, so TWITTer seems to be perfect for them. I was surprised to see twitter catching on so well. Even my favorite Pacifica radio station's hosts can now be followed on twitter.

I just don't get it...

[PrinceHal]

11:17 AM on 06/30/2009

"The quickest examples that come to mind are Windows from Apple, Wordperfect, XBox from Playstation, Explorer from Netscape, and Office from Lotus Notes."

Shouldn't portions of the preceding sentence have read "Word from WordPerfect," instead of just "WordPerfect;" "Internet Explorer from Netscape" instead of "Explorer from Netscape," and "Office from Lotus Symphony." instead of "Office from Lotus Notes"?

Still, I don't remember Word as a program that Microsoft marketed in response to WordPerfect. There were several good word-processors in the DOS years, and the best were probably Word and WordPerfect. But who can forget XyWrite or Wordstar -- or whatever YOU were using? Word's DOS version was always a strong No. 2 choice pre-Windows. It was transiting to Windows that knocked WordPerfect off its No. 1 perch, but even that took a while.

[DennyCrane]

10:08 AM on 06/30/2009

They already have one thing in common. Both are for narcissists.

[EminemsRevenge]

08:29 AM on 06/30/2009

The root of Twitter is TWIT...and i only use it when i got something twittish to say. Facebook, on the other hand, is probably the most childish "community" on the internet.

Whilst i still use Xanga for my main blogging since you don't need a whole lot of HTML to use it, i think the facebook move is more akin to Xanga than Microsoft. The latter HAS a legacy of dominance, the former has a history of copying everybody in order to TRY to be somebody...giving up their soul in the process!

[bikerdude]

06:52 AM on 06/30/2009

I kind of like Facebook and absolutely hate Twitter...

[KT8711]

12:19 AM on 06/30/2009

I joined Facebook back in the day (2004). This was when you could only join if you were a college student... and if your college wasn't on Facebook, you had to petition them to add your school as a network. You couldn't join as a high school student, you couldn't join as a member of a geographic area, etc.

In my opinion, Facebook was at its best in 2006. They had added more functionality to pictures, by allowing tags, and added statuses. There weren't any 3rd party applications yet, and Facebook hadn't employed the newsfeed/mini-feed yet.

It has really gone downhill since then...... you know Facebook has jumped the shark when your mom is trying to friend you.

[DDBabyDiva]

02:03 AM on 06/30/2009

So what you are saying it was cool when everyone in the world didn't think it was cool. Gotcha.

LOL. I just joined Facebook about 2 or 3 weeks ago and was AMAZED that over 100 people in my address book was on there. I thought that it was still a college only site. It's been amazing for networking, however. So, it definitely has value for me.

[KT8711]

06:29 AM on 06/30/2009

No, what I'm saying it, it was far better when the site didn't try to be everything at once! It was so much easier to use a few years ago, before they decided that instead of being a networking site, that it had to be Twitter, YouTube, a place to get horoscopes, a place to take stupid quizzes, a place to send people virtual gifts, etc.

Before the news feed, it used to be a site focused on other people's contact information. Now, the primary focus in everyone's profile is who they talked to and what they did that day! Honestly, it's resembling MySpace more and more every single day.

Clearly, you haven't been a user long enough to know what I'm talking about.

[DRaymond]

08:36 PM on 06/29/2009

Correcting the article:
Exchange was Microsoft's answer to Lotus Notes, Excel was Microsoft's answer to another dominant Lotus product, 1-2-3.

[TallyLass]

08:34 PM on 06/29/2009

The Facebook guy just paid out a s hit load of money a few weeks ago, to a guy who says facebook was his idea. I am on fb for now, but I don't like twitter. So if they get to twitterish, that's it for me.

[Antifascist-08]

06:58 PM on 06/29/2009

Perfect.

I was looking for something to do with all my extra time- some group I can believe in.

Facetwits.

Perfect!

[LeeLoosMultiPass]

05:38 PM on 06/29/2009

Yes, it is becoming twitter - the last incarnation was and is an abomination. It is is giant leap BACKWARDS for Facebook. Who takes a viable product like Facebook and then ruins it by going backwards (imitating twitter)? Foolish, simply foolish.

[mlrlmsw]

10:37 PM on 06/29/2009

I totally agree - I'm using fb less since the "Twitter" like look and news feeds. I've had to hide many "friends" because there was too much garbage on my wall to wade through. Fb is losing what made it enjoyable to play with.

[LeeLoosMultiPass]

01:42 AM on 06/30/2009

I use it less also - and I've noticed a lack of status updates since that latest "update." I was having so much darn fun on facebook - and now - it's just boring and tedious. I'm not much of a twitter fan either, though it's fun to follow some celebrities for about two minutes a day.

If someone else comes along who wants to do a "Bill Gates" on Facebook's Zuckerberg, then have at it. Just go back a couple iterations and people would flock to the site.

Facebook and longevity - eh, not so much.

[Obamasoldier]

05:19 PM on 06/29/2009

Twitter SUCKS imo

[robbyJ]

05:04 PM on 06/29/2009

twitters draw is the famous people updating a lot.

facebook is the new myspace. in 10 years it won't be talked about anymore

Twitter i think will servive the test of time

my book twit face space

[W i l l]

04:57 PM on 06/29/2009

Facebook...is that yet another new internet start up with aspirations of dominating market share in the most fickle of cultures on the planet?

[AdamInMaryland]

04:49 PM on 06/29/2009

The reason why this is such a stupid idea is that Twitter has, at best, 5 or 6 million users. Facebook has a MASSIVE number of users that completely dwarfs Twitter. Why does Facebook see Twitter as a threat?

http://www.livingwithanerd.com/Blogs