Twitter is the new Friendster

I see many similarities between the current day Twitter and the 2003 version of Friendster.

New method of social connections - check
Wildly popular and rapid growth - check
Unable to provide acceptable reliability and uptime - check
Declined buyout offer Friendster - check; Twitter - ???

So, if we believe that history often repeats itself, it would behoove you stop what you are doing right now and create a version of Twitter that:

Doesn’t try to do the complicated and resource intensive part
Looks butt ugly
Has a small initial focus on music and bands
Has a respectable uptime

Essentially, be what MySpace was to Friendster. A secondmover that offered a technology subset and had a music angle.

Friendster

There are an incredible amount of Twitter users who are genuinely hooked on the service and becoming fed up with its reliability. But where can they turn? No where. So they just put up with it. That’s the beauty of monopolies.

So, the challenge is to analyze the Twitter service and determine the parts that make scaling it difficult. Take out as many as you can. Make it look butt ugly. Put a music spin on it. Provide rock solid uptime.

Combine parts in mixing bowl, bake at 425 degrees for 2 years, serve piping hot to News Corp.