Devil’s Advocate: Why you shouldn’t be worried about App.net’s culture

After I wrote about App.net’s apparent culture problem today in this post, I read some more about it. Specifically, I went ahead and read the API Spec. Then, I came upon this article by Matthew Ingram on GigaOm that talked about how App.net is not really a twitter clone but a lot more than that. The article makes a pretty important point. So, going with the flow, here’s my two cents about how the article I wrote earlier might just be wrong –

When we look at App.net as common users, we see a stream of posts, a lot of apps that are being built on top of it and the customary box asking us our thoughts. That’s the face of the App.net Alpha as we see it right now. But let’s step back and look at what Dalton had promised us. Dalton talked about a realtime feed, a financially sustainable API and a viable solution to today’s ad-supported social network conundrum. But enough of the lengthy words. In essence, Dalton promised us a platform and an API. That’s it. Above and beyond that, he pretty much said, go, do whatever you want to. (more…)