Apple in talks to buy twitter for $700 million - that's one way to monetize

disclosure - clicking on image will make you follow me:)Digital media blogs, TechCrunch and Valleywag, both claim to have access to an inside source at Apple who believes the deal is already at the late stages of negotiation, with the hope of completion by June 8. This is so Apple could announce the acquisition of Twitter at its annual Worldwide Developers Conference in San Jose.

Apple’s $700m offer is meant to be a full cash bid - a marked contrast to Facebook’s $500m offer for Twitter last November, which was a cash and stock hybrid offer. The deal failed to go through partially because Twitter’s investors could not agree on whether Facebook’s stock was worth as much as the social networking company claimed it was. When Twitter turned down the Facebook deal, co-founder Biz Stone said the company wanted to remain independent to expand on “its messaging service and there would be no disagreement about the value of its stock”.

twitter use explodes

Twitter traffic is up 700 percent over last year, and it’s all thanks to the old-timers. That’s according to the latest numbers from ComScore, which says Twitter drew almost 10 million visitors worldwide in February 2009. In the past two months alone, Twitter traffic has grown by 5 million worldwide visitors, while U.S. Twitter traffic accounted for 4 million visitors in February 2009—a 1000 percent jump over last year.

Social networking isn’t for spamming

An article by Peter Cohen on macworld.com where he discusses how annoying it is getting spammed on twitter.

“Everywhere you look, businesses are discovering how social networking — Twitter presences, Facebook accounts and more — are effective ways to reach customers. But companies that start using social networks as ways to spam or troll for new business ought to be put in their place, and right quick. Case in point: MacHeist.

I’ve been using Twitter for a while, and have amassed a few hundred people whose Tweets I follow. They’re professional colleagues, friends, people who I know, and some relative strangers who say witty or insightful things — the reasons I follow people on Twitter are varied. But one way or the other, they’re all people with whom I share common interests or some kind of connection.

In the past day, I’ve lost count of the number of times I’ve seen this Tweet:

“I bought the @MacHeist 3 Bundle. 12 Top Mac apps worth $900+ for just $39 AND I just got Delicious Library 2 FREE!”

This is beyond irksome. It irritated me into a frothing rage last night, and I’ll explain why in a moment. First some background:”

To read the entire article, hit the source link below.

source:macworld