Twitter-fueled hedge fund bit the dust, but it actually worked
A hedge fund that analyzed tweets to figure out where to invest closed its doors after just one month, and is now preparing a public Twitter-based trading tool.
CornellNYC Tech taps ex-Twitter CTO as Founding Entrepreneurial Officer
Cornell University’s NYC tech school is taking shape. The school announced today that it has named Greg Pass, former chief technology officer at Twitter and and VP of engineering, as its founding entrepreneurial officer.
Pass, who also graduated with a …
Pakistan bans, then unblocks Twitter over ‘blasphemous’ Muhammad drawings (update)
Twitter has been restored in Pakistan after being down for around eight hours. A Twitter spokesperson confirmed to VentureBeat that Twitter made no changes on its part to become restored and that the decision was purely on the government's end.
Twitter uses millions of embedded Tweet buttons to customize your Who-to-Follow experience
Twitter is experimenting with personalized lists of Who to Follow accounts. Interestingly, the company is accomplishing this using data generated by millions of embedded Tweet buttons around the web.
The Who To Follow functionality has been on Twitter for several …
Twitter brings its best to your inbox with new email service
Twitter wants to bring the best of your timeline directly to your email inbox.
The new email service takes a digest approach. In a post on the company blog, growth and international director Othman Laraki writes that the email summary …
Twitter nabs targeting pros behind startup RestEngine
Twitter has snatched up the talent behind social marketing automation company RestEngine.
“We’re very excited to announce that the RestEngine team is joining the Twitter flock! Just over two-and-a-half years ago we founded RestEngine to help social app publishers send …
Twitter defends rights of user, quashes subpoena for tweets
Caught in the middle of political hot-potato case, The People of the State of New York versus Malcolm Harris, Twitter has gone to bat for one of its users.
In a move applauded by the American Civil Liberties Union, the …
Twitter tries to better predict the stories you want to see
Information discovery is the name of Twitter’s game, so Tuesday the home for short-and-sweet bursts of news announced enhanced tools to better predict more of the stories members want to see.
Twitter has tweaked its Discover tab to feature more …
Twitter releases eight case studies for developers to digest
The handy devs down at Twitter have just released some case studies into the wild. These eight case studies delve into the best practices of companies and products using the Twitter APIs.
Zappos, Etsy, Pocket Gems, Reuters, ESPN, Esri, Tiny …
Twitter for iPhone, Android updated with better search and discovery features
Hey Twitter fanatics, your favorite social network for short bursts of information has released updates to its iPhone and Android applications so that you can feed the beast and find out what’s happening even faster.
Twitter for iPhone and Twitter …
Revealed: How Twitter’s secret offer for Instagram made Facebook pay $1B
Editor's Pick
The secret details of the $1 billion deal between Facebook and Instagram are more convoluted than anyone thought. VentureBeat has learned that Instagram chief executive and co-founder Kevin Systrom first got an offer and a term sheet from Twitter, then …
5 tech deals that need to happen
Guest Post
Facebook’s $1 billion purchase of Instagram was the topic on everyone’s lips at Mega Startup Weekend last Saturday and Sunday. The world’s most expensive “Like” has clearly gotten tech entrepreneurs buzzing about who will be next. While there’s no way …
CrowdFanatic wants to become an “online Tahrir Square”
The debate club is coming to Facebook, and no, I don’t mean the after-school activity. CrowdFanatic is pitting Facebook fan pages against each other today, opening up the “walled garden of fans” that are social groups for lively back-and-forth.
“Facebook’s …
How expanding Twitter’s pledge could end the patent wars
Guest Post
Twitter’s momentous announcement yesterday that it would only use its patent portfolio defensively was received with wide acclaim by the tech world. With two small changes, Twitter’s Innovator’s Patent Agreement (IPA) could actually completely change the landscape of software patents.…
Can Twitter and Yammer fix our broken patent system?
Twitter announced this morning that it will only use its patents for defensive purposes. That’s a brilliant move and it could be an important step to fixing our broken patent system.
I have some personal experience with the patent system. …
Twitter takes a preemptive, common-sense stance on patents
Ah, we love the smell of a patent lawsuit in the morning around here. It’s something between week-old garbage and the unmistakable stench of attorney ego.
But patent lawsuits are often based on nothing more than greed and can end …
Twitter snaps up social media analytics startup Hotspots.io
Twitter purchased social-media analytics company and YCombinator alumn Hotspots.io for an unknown amount of money on Monday, according to Hotspots.io’s website. According to the company, Twitter’s revenue-engineering team will gain Hotspots.io’s employees.
There’s not much information on Hotspots.io — the …
Advertising to predictable old men just got easier: Twitter brings ads to BlackBerry
If your company’s target audience is average, middle-aged men who don’t like change (e.g. Hank from King of the Hill), then Twitter just did you a huge favor.
The microblogging social network announced today it is extending the ability …
12 companies getting local right for small businesses
I've spent much of the last year talking about how the sites small businesses rely on to advertise and promote themselves -- think Yelp and Groupon -- are failing them. In fact, helping small businesses at the local level is extremely challenging for technology companies, for the following reasons:
After Facebook outbid Twitter for Instagram, Jack Dorsey stopped using it to post photos
Top venture capitalists and Mark Zuckerberg weren’t the only ones interested in high flying photo sharing app Instagram. Twitter founder Jack Dorsey, an early angel investor in Instagram, was also trying to buy the service in the months before Facebook …
