Holy sh*t week forces Twitter top brass to go on ‘retreat’

Twitter’s top execs - what’s left of them - are expected to go on a retreat today as they look for inspiration on how to pull the microblogging service out what is looking less like a slump and more like a nosedive. The claim, tweeted by CNBC, is just the latest bizzaro development after a weekend that has already seen five …

[amanfromMars 1]

Real Big Beta MetaData Bunker Busting Block Buster ...... with Future AIKeys Unfakeable

Hi, Joe,

Might I suggest their engagement with http://www.ur2die4.com/160125-2/ ... with/for Peace and Order Supplied by SMARTR Tweets ..... for Accompanying Sweet Treats.

Now that is akin to Immaculate Heavenly Bounty, MeThinks and Cogito Ergo Sum being BetaMetaDataTested for Realisation with Presentations. Mass SMARTR HyperRadioProActive Media Mogul Programming for Virtual AIMachine Systems.

[John 104]

Re: Real Big Beta MetaData Bunker Busting Block Buster ...... with Future AIKeys Unfakeable

What the FECK did you just say? I read it but it made my head hurt.

[Anon E. Mouse]

Blow the doors off?

Will he have to change his car to one where the doors go side to side instead of up and down now he's left the 3 comma club?

[The Man Who Fell To Earth]

The inevitable is happening

People are figuring out that Twitter is for Twits.

[Anonymous Coward]

Re: The inevitable is happening

Nah, Twitter's just too 'yesterday.' Maybe even too 'yesterhour,' considering the average attention span these days... ..I mean these hours.

[allthecoolshortnamesweretaken]

The problem as such is not "top executives" going to a retreat (or is it going into a re-treat?).

The problem is: they will come back. Full of "ideas" and stuff...

On a related note: when will Jack Dorsey make the transition from executive to executor?

[Anonymous Coward]

I dream of a world...

Without Twitter and Facebook.

They offer no value to me, and it gets worse.

Companies (in my particular case UK based financial institutions ) are using these channels as a cheap method of dealing with customers.

I don't really have a problem with that until you hit what I have had, which is an issue I want to discuss with a real person in real time (a phone call).

You are told the most effective way to register a complaint is to use social media.

Taking time to make a phone call and speak to a representative is it seems now a second class means of communication.

Oh dear.

[John 104]

Re: I dream of a world...

@Keef

I can't give you enough thumbs up. I work in tech and have for quite some time. I can't fucking stand social media for your reasons above among others. I just wish it would go away, but I don't think that is going to happen any time soon, or ever.

[a_yank_lurker]

Re: I dream of a world...

I recently had to actually talk to on the phone and face-to-face with various reps over a couple credit card issues. It was actually relatively pleasant and got the issue resolved. What will run companies realize is there are times a customer needs to talk to someone who can resolve the problem while talking to them. Provide these resources and you have relatively happy customers who are likely to be repeat customers.

[Ali Um Bongo]

Re: I dream of a world...

*"...Companies (in my particular case UK based financial institutions ) are using these channels as a cheap method of dealing with customers..."*

I really don't get it myself, either.

Send a company a polite email or letter these days and they'll completely ignore you. Call them "a bunch of useless dicks" on Twitter and, a lot of the time you'll have a personal response and your problem resolved within minutes.

Likewise with individuals. Why the need to carry on your conversations in public? In the olden days, people would ring, or text, or email to invite friends out for a meal or a pint. Now, instead of contacting the people concerned directly, you "announce" your plans to the world, on Twatter or FacePuke and hope that the people you want to turn up will see it. [I missed a mate's wedding a couple of years back because my "invitation" was sent via FacePuke, where I don't even have an account].

And finally [while I'm on a roll], since when did Twatter become a branch of Reuters? There's barely a news site left now that doesn't feel the need to flesh out reports with screengrabs of the Twattersphere's opinions or observations on the story in question. WTF is that all about? Why does the BBC think I give a flying fuck about what '@Ice-Ninja-Death-Masta' [real name Kevin Snurdge, age and IQ: 17, unemployed lavatory attendant, from Stockport] thinks about... well... anything really?

[TeeCee]

Hmm.

A "retreat"? You're right, that does sound rather quasi-religious.

Twitter names commerce chief Nathan Hubbard as interim media head...

Any relation.........?

[Ali Um Bongo]

Oh Well...

If everyone else is just going to leave this one rolling about on the goal line, I might as well take the tap-in:

** From RETWEET to RETREAT !!! **

[Crowd goes wild. Ali Um Bongo runs off down touchline with jersey pulled up over face]

[Michael Wojcik]

Re: Oh Well...

Crowd goes wild

It didn't, particularly. That pun seems like it ought to work, but feels awkward.

Still, I'll give you an upvote for the framing.

[Michael Wojcik]

Re: Hmm.

A "retreat"? You're right, that does sound rather quasi-religious.

I don't see why. It's been common parlance in industry and academia in the US for decades.

Google nGram Viewer suggests the phrase first gained lasting popularity in the late 1960s and enjoyed what looks like large polynomial, if not exponential, growth since 1980 or so.

Retreats, in the business world, are simply off-site gatherings that last more than a day and include meetings and social interaction. They can be a complete waste of time, of course, but I've been on several that were pleasant, informative, and productive.

Of course, those were all with organizations that actually produce stuff.

[lukewarmdog]

Ads

The problem isn't Twitter, you either use it or you don't. It's not offensive like Facebook and to my mind anyway does have real world valuable application.

Again imho, the problem is the ad supported model for anything. I've never bought due to an ad, I don't click them, I go out of my way to block them. You need something else not cleverer ways to show better (in some undefined way) ads. They should trial a sub model to see what happens because an money haemorrhaging ad supported model that doesn't shows ads to its most valuable customers clearly doesn't understand what valuable or customer means.

[404]

Re: Ads

While I see your point, in all honesty why would anyone sub Twitter*? Place is just an echo chamber with occasional name & shame to vent your displeasure at company/politician.

*Stupid question, of course they would get subs - the US has a surplus of surface dwelling idjits... but not enough to support the company indefinitely.

[a_yank_lurker]

Re: Ads

@404 - The problem Twitter has relative to Facebook or LinkedIn is that for many there is absolutely no value. There is some real value to Facebook and LinkedIn and I do not use Facebook at all and LinkedIn sparingly.

[disgruntled yank]

Meanwhile

Is Zuck sounding forth the trumped that will never call retweet?

[Ali Um Bongo]

Unicorns in General

Seems to me the problem is that we have the two extremes of the free-market economy on display, either side of the Atlantic

1: On the 'Merkin side of the pond, it appears that you only have to hint that you've just had the revolutionary idea to offer people something they already have and don't like but with a new twattish name and annoying website attached [probably heavily making use of the word "Arse-Sum!"] and... Bingo!... eleventy billion $$$ worth of venture capital lands in your lap.

Meanwhile

2: On the European side of the pond, you come up with absolute proof that you've [discovered a cure for cancer | produced nuclear fusion in a jam-jar | built a prototype quantum computer from RaspberryPi parts] and ask for a couple of hundred €€€ to get a few leaflets printed about it and you're given 43 forms to fill in and asked to put up your house and one of your kidneys as security, in return for a tenth of what you asked for.