Michael Arrington, author of the article, concludes:
> But the fact that this is coming from Odeo makes me wonder – what is this company doing to make their core offering compelling? How do their shareholders feel about side projects like Twttr when their primary product line is, besides the excellent design, a total snoozer?
Well, Michael, you might be smart, but you were quite wrong on this one. TWTR is currently a $29B company.
You could read it that way, although a more generous interpretation is that he was asking, rightfully, why is a side project the one getting interesting innovation rather than the core product and will the company properly support and nurture this side project? Lots of companies produce interesting innovations that never see the light of day cause the "core" of the company doesn't support them or purposefully kills them off.
From their history via Wikipedia:
"The first Twitter prototype, developed by Dorsey and contractor Florian Weber, was used as an internal service for Odeo employees[31] and the full version was introduced publicly on July 15, 2006.[13] In October 2006, Biz Stone, Evan Williams, Dorsey, and other members of Odeo formed Obvious Corporation and acquired Odeo, together with its assets — including Odeo.com and Twitter.com — from the investors and shareholders.[32] Williams fired Glass, who was silent about his part in Twitter's startup until 2011.[33] Twitter spun off into its own company in April 2007.[34]"
> But the fact that this is coming from Odeo makes me wonder – what is this company doing to make their core offering compelling? How do their shareholders feel about side projects like Twttr when their primary product line is, besides the excellent design, a total snoozer?
Well, Michael, you might be smart, but you were quite wrong on this one. TWTR is currently a $29B company.