The Risks Of Tying Yourself To Rising Tech Giants

A recent study found that the vast majority of Twitter users actually use third party applications to manage their Twitter activity (“tweets”, etc.).

Clearly, providing an open platform with  Application Programming Interfaces (API) or a Software Development Kits (SDK) has helped Twitter quickly gain critical mass.  Instead of becoming a tool, it becomes a platform upon which other tools and services operate.

Though for all of these companies who have built their business on the Twitter platform, there is a fundamental problem.  What happens when Twitter goes down ?  Don’t think it can happen ?  Think again – it has in the past, and it might again in the future.  Worse yet, what happens when Twitter dissolves entirely ?  Doubting that possibility too ?  It certainly wouldn’t be the first social network to die away.

As we know, today’s revolutionary is tomorrow’s dictator.  It only took 16 years for Apple to go from the perception of being an underdog to hyper controlling corporate behemoth.

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=017uJzbZY80]

Here’s an interesting article about Apple’s latest image issues (this time with the iPhone 4)

Smart software execs know better than to put all of their eggs into one basket.  Rather than tie to one platform, tie to several.  And continue to grow the integration offering.  Keeping your ear to the ground with regards to your customers needs, wants, and habits will help you stay one step ahead of not only your competition, but every evolving technology as well.