The Twitter Car Has A Flat Tire and No Jack
Robert Scoble had the chance to sit down and chat with Twitter co-founders Evan Williams and Biz Stone today for a 30 minute interview. During the interview Biz Stone compared the architecture fix for Twitter as repairing a flat tire on a car going 95 mph, which he admits, is frankly “scary”.
But what sort of people attempt to repair a moving vehicle? Daredevils, suicide risks, and morons are the three personalities which come to mind. If your car gets a flat, you don’t keep running at full-speed unless you’re on the run from the cops in a high-speed chase. Evan Williams says that when a car gets a flat at such speeds, you have to lean down on the flat and let the other three wheels do the job.
Evan Williams and Biz Stone, the dare-deviling duo.
When any sensible law-abiding citizen gets a flat tire, they don’t continue speeding along. In fact, most sensible people will come to a complete stop on the side of the road. If Twitter is truly only running on three tires at the moment, is it time to take a pit stop on the shoulder for a tune-up?
When you’re cruising along at speeds of 95 mph, you lose the ability to use essential tools which are needed to keep you running full-steam ahead. There’s no way to jack up the car and slip under the hood as the ground speeds by below. As the metal rim and axle chafe against the hard concrete, there is bound to be even more long-term damage done to the car.
When Twitter disabled IM compatibility and lowered their API down to 30 requests per hour, this was the sign that they are now running on only 3 tires. And anyone who knows anything about cars knows that this is only possible for a short amount of time before the car either catches fire, or brings itself to a screeching, spark spitting halt.
Filed under Tech, social |3 Responses to “The Twitter Car Has A Flat Tire and No Jack”
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Are you proposing that they suspend the service while fixing it, or start new from the group up while leaving the existing service intact?
Good analogy, by the way.
I’m not really suggesting anything. Rather just pointing out that the own analogy they used is completely misaligned with how they are handling the issue.
Does Twitter have triple-A ?