Apple buying Twitter?

According to a rumor Apple may be in negotiations to buy Twitter, the popular microblogging service. The same rumor is speculating the buy price at around $700 million, and that Apple wants to get the deal clinched enough to announce it at the WWDC.

Gawker - Could Apple Buy Twitter? - Acquisitions

If true, I am wondering what the purpose would be. Apple has long kept to the standard that they are a hardware company, with their software division being more a selling point for the hardware than a product in itself. Could this herald a change in their basic business plan?

Simply put: what a waste of money. As a business supported purely by venture capital with few, if any, plans to turn a profit, Twitter is a money hole. While the service may be popular, from a business perspective it is not very useful (I am by no means an economist though).

What would Apple do with Twitter though?

Eric559 said:

What would Apple do with Twitter though?

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They could probably integrated with some of their products but like I said earlier, there is no profit in that. Spending $700 million on Twitter would be lost money.

Agreed, this makes no sense and does not fit the Apple business model.

As a shareholder I would not be pleased with this purchase. ANd besides, twitter is the lamest thing around. I hope Apple doesn't join forces with such lameness.

Twitter is a fad that will die off as everything else has. I can see why Twitter's owners would sell. Is Apple really that stupid to buy it?

kpmedia said:

Twitter is a fad that will die off as everything else has. I can see why Twitter's owners would sell. Is Apple really that stupid to buy it?

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Isn't that what people were saying about Facebook five years ago?

Discerptor said:

Isn't that what people were saying about Facebook five years ago?

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...and MySpace before that.

While I think it might not be a bad idea for Apple to get a bigger chunk of the web services market (right now, MobileMe is pretty much it), I just don't see how this particular business could turn a sizable profit.

Twitter's owners would be insane NOT to sell. They know there's no profit generating model with Twitter and getting $700 million is more money than they would ever see on their own. This is very similar to the Youtube owners. They got $1.65 billion in a sale to Google, no way they would have managed to earn that kind of money on their own.

Sales to big companies is always in the best interests of fad companies with no practical business model.

Nope (to answer the thread).

That doesn't seem very smart on apple's behalf. Twitter has nothing to do with apple anyway, and its not going to be making any real profit. Beside, twitter is stupid. I don't really feel like telling everyone I know that I stopped at a red light, just because I can...

I doubt it; Twitter has been slowly dieing over the past few months. Any money they could have made from it has dramatically reduced now and I doubt Apple see much use in it either.

Apple can't really earn any funds by purchasing Twitter. It's more likely that Google would purchase it, because it's one more step into dominating the web...

zewazir said:

If true, I am wondering what the purpose would be. Apple has long kept to the standard that they are a hardware company, with their software division being more a selling point for the hardware than a product in itself. Could this herald a change in their basic business plan?

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Actually I this all changed they changed from Apple computers to Apple. And itunes is a software thing and really popular and profitable. So twitter might becoem profitable too one day. Everyone I know famous and not seems to be using twitter today. I can see why people might say Apple might want to buy twitter. But I have to agree with the above posters. This to me does not sound like something Apple would do.

the8thark said:

Everyone I know famous and not seems to be using twitter today.

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Hi, I'm baggss, and I'm a MF veteran. Now that you "know" me. read my sig line. Now you know someone who doesn't.

;D

twitter is the dumbest thing ever. seriously.

baggss said:

Hi, I'm baggss, and I'm a MF veteran. Now that you "know" me. read my sig line. Now you know someone who doesn't.

;D

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Hahahaha! Awesome.

Twitter is dumb for random dinks that say nothing important but using it for networking and business/marketing is a great tool.

Yeah, Twitter definitely has a purpose, and it's not updating your followers that you're taking a crap while eating a bagel.

For example, I run a website that follows my local (and alma mater) high school during it's boys basketball and football seasons. With twitter, I can update the scores on the fly straight to my website from my cell phone. Ever since we integrated it this past fall, it's been great.

I once used twitter to follow mindless celebrities and athletes, updating constantly about random and dumb things, and while I'll say that some of the things they type can be hilarious, it's overall mindless banter..

If you have a purpose for twitter, it can definitely be a great tool.