Is Bit.ly’s Twitter advantage unfair?
The rise of Twitter as a social-media powerhouse and its micro-blogging platform has created a renewed urgency for URL-shortening services.
There are now endless numbers of websites vying to shorten your too-long tweets to conform to the 140-character limit, but as in every competitive industry not everyone can survive and thrive. This week one of the players, Canadian-based Tr.im (owned by Nambu Network), announced it was throwing in the towel.
Now a small business closing up shop is not normally newsworthy, except when they cry foul as the ship is sinking. While on the one hand Nambu president Eric Woodward told Computerworld’s Gregg Keiser that Tr.im was “accepting the realities and moving on,” he also seized the opportunity to take a shot at Twitter for making Bit.ly its default URL shortening service.
“They’re the default, and even if we’re better, it won’t matter, so what’s the point?” said Woodward. “As soon as Bit.ly was made the default, the game was over.”
Tr.im initially announced its demise through a blog post last Sunday, but 48 hours later did an about face to say it had been resurrected and will keep on trimming those URLs “indefinitely, while we continue to consider our options in regards to Tr.im’s future.” (see Tr.im blog post)
Tr.im further stoked the Bit.ly-Twitter relationship debate, by adding that “Bit.ly has a monopoly position that cannot be challenged with reasonable investment or innovation unless Twitter offers choice. This is a basic reality of challenging monopolies. Bit.ly has deep personal connections and agreements with Twitter that we simply cannot compete with. And it is our humble opinion that this type of favoritism will become an issue for all Twitter developers.”
If having Bit.ly as Twitter’s go-to link shortener is unfair, you would think industry-leader TinyURL would join in the debate. After all it was Tiny’s Twitter perch that Bit.ly usurped back in May. While Bit.ly has quickly become tops on Twitter, overall TinyURL still controls more than 70 percent of the market (see Tweetmeme report from March 2009). TinyURL founder Kevin Gilbertson appears unfazed by Tr.im’s attempts to kick up a dust storm around this issue and certainly has no plans to cease operating now that Tiny is no longer Twitter’s best man.
What the Tesla founders’ feud can teach entrepreneurs
High-powered electric-car startup Tesla Motors has hit a speed bump with the filing of a lawsuit by former CEO and founder Martin Eberhard.
The libel suit, filed on May 26 in San Mateo County, Calif. Superior Court, alleges current CEO Elon Musk falsely portrayed himself as the founder of the company and orchestrated Eberhard’s ouster as original CEO in 2007. In the lengthy 22-page document, Eberhard accuses Musk and Tesla of, among other things, libel, slander, breach of contract, negligence and failure to pay wages. The suit doesn’t even refer to Musk as a co-founder, but simply as one of “various investors,” who joined the Tesla board in April 2004.
Eberhard’s suit claims that from the moment he came on board, Musk “began a campaign to appropriate control of Tesla Motors and Eberhard’s legacy as the company’s founder and visionary.” The suit further alleges that Musk “began a pattern and practice of defaming and disparaging Eberhard in various widely distributed media outlets,” a few of which included The New York Times, Newsweek, USA Today and NPR.
Musk has responded to the accusations in a lengthy blog posting on Tesla’s corporate website. According to Musk, the posting is an attempt to “correct several misconceptions propagated by Eberhard that are now being reported as truth.”
While claiming he was “pushed out of the company he founded,” Eberhard agreed to leave because he felt it was “in the best interest of Tesla” and that he hoped his “vision for the company would be realized and his spirit would continue even in his absence.” Something Eberhard now feels never happened.
In a further bizarre twist, Eberhard accuses Tesla of giving his own personal Roadster – the second model off the production line and one valued “as high as several million dollars because of its historical value” – to one of Musk’s friends. His suit claims when Eberhard eventually received his own Roadster, it had been “smashed into the back of a truck.”
I’m excited about electric cars news but tired of hearing about Tesla Motors- until they start producing cheaper models. For electric cars to be serious contenders, they need to be mid-priced economy vehicles that most households can by with tax incentives etc. According to new reports, up to 1/3 of cars buyers want to go electric- which would reduce oil dependency, green house emissions, foreign oil dependency, health care costs, and create jobs. For more information about electric cars, I suggest checking out the website http://www.twocentspermile.com or http://www.bit.ly/2centspermile
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