Who knew making an API open could yield so many apps? By making its services available on more than just its Web site, Twitter has spawned a huge ecosystem of third-party apps that in one way or another let you tweet.
How big is this ecosystem? Try 70,000 apps for things like managing lists and searching for videos. Pretty remarkable considering you only need one or two. But that market is huge and growing and Twitter has announced a developer conference for next month. Datamation has more.
There are millions of Twitter users, but the number of application developers supporting the microblogging platform isn’t too shabby, either.
In an inaugural e-mail newsletter detailing the company’s progress, Twitter co-founder Biz Stone said some 70,000 registered applications have been created for the platform. Third-party applications do everything from helping users manage their Twitter accounts and lists of followers to finding discussion groups and videos on specific topics.
While often dinged in industry circles for not having a revenue model, Twitter continues to expand as a company: Stone said in his e-mail that registered user accounts have grown more than 1,500 percent while Twitter’s number of employees have grown 500 percent.
Company officials have indicated they plan to introduce advertising and other potential revenue streams.