Rafe Needleman Wants Twitter To Close For Renovations

Rafe is pissed:

[from A proposal for Twitter: Shut it down | Webware : Cool Web apps for everyone]

If Twitter can't deliver a reliable experience, I think its best bet is to close until it can. That way, we can all come back to the site at the same time, all together, instead of each of us showing up one by one and finding it deserted.

Rafe sounds like a guy who got so-so service at a neighborhood bistro, and wants it to close down until it comes up with the perfect menu. Meanwhile, the people at the other tables haven't even noticed. Or if they do, it's just a memory of him arguing with the waiter about the fly in his soup.

Rafe: It's free, man.

Comments

[Svetlana Gladkova]

Stowe, it's an excellent comparison with the bistro. But we in the web 2.0 world has been spoiled by expecting that even those things that are free still should be of superb quality. And even when we can't say "Hey, guys, I pay for your service so make it work for me not to lose my money" we still argue that the services should still be perfect because we pay either with pageviews (though Twitter does not make money on those directly - indirectly maybe by obtaining funding based on its popularity) or at least with our loyalty. This makes it hard for startups because users are rarely forgiving.

[Duncan]

Stowe

what's free got to do with it? Twitter have set themselves up as a utility provider, and any utility provision comes with an expectation of service provision, which they simply are no longer delivering on. From my take (and from what they've publicly said) even if we all paid hundreds each a year it would have made zero difference anyway because they seem quite clueless + likewise money wouldn't be the answer, they still have no shortage of that anyway.

[Mark Evans]

Stowe,

You're exactly right. It puzzles me why people get so upset about a free service that isn't exactly mission critical to anyone's digital existence. If people don't like Twitter's up-and-down nature, use something else like Pownce.

[Stowe Boyd]

Svetlana - I agree that we expect excellence across the board. But I still maintain that some downtime from Twitter -- driven in large part by it's popularity -- is like being upset that your neighborhood bar is so popular you can't get in.

Duncan - It's become a utility because of its popularity: as more have joined, it has become a great way to remain connected. But the metaphor could just as well be the neighborhood bar which you can't get into because it's packed.

[Lou Paglia]

Stowe: completely agree, at some point we lose sight of the concept of free services. I could see getting this level of attention of "paid" services but not for free. And speaking of "free", people are "free" to walk away from twitter any time they want.

[Justin Thorp]

Yeah I don't understand all the whining about Twitter.

Yes Twitter is a really awesome utility but it's not my primary one. I'm not going to give up using the phone or e-mail in favor of Twitter. So... it doesn't phase me too much when it's down.

Even if a competitor were to rise up... I really don't think everyone is going to jolt over to the new service. Plus the new service would face all the same challenges that Twitter has.