Comments on: Magpie Tweaks its Feathers

By: Twitter And Magpie: Point And Counterpoint | How To Split An Atom

Twitter And Magpie: Point And Counterpoint | How To Split An Atom — Thu, 27 Nov 2008 16:23:05 +0000

[...] Advertising can be done without going to the extreme of blindly spamming for money. Magpie is a step in that direction. They have already reacted to user response and allowed pre-approval of ads. ['reacted to user response'] [...]

By: Stuart Robertson

Stuart Robertson — Wed, 26 Nov 2008 03:24:14 +0000

I’m one of the people writing a filter to hide the magpie ads, and it does require some way of identifying them in the text of the tweet.

The reason you want to let people filter out the ads is that it gives them an alternative to simply unfollowing magpie users. Without a way to indentify and block the ads, magpie users will see more people simply unfollow them.

With or without the hashtag, users will notice if people they’re following start making exactly the same posts as others and without a RT or via referencing another user. If those Tweets are extremely out of context, which magpie ads so far have been, it will be easy to see who’s using magpie.

By: James Willamor

James Willamor — Wed, 26 Nov 2008 02:06:53 +0000

Good review. I don’t have a problem with Magpie as long as somebody isn’t sending out adds every other message, or if half the people I follow all tweet the same add the same day. One or two a day is hardly noticeable.

It seems they really pay a lot per tweet, but then I thought about how I click more links in Twitter than on pretty much any other service/website. They must be getting a lot of click-throughs per tweet.

By: admin

admin — Wed, 26 Nov 2008 02:06:09 +0000

@Danny – fair points. I have notices that the frequency of ads is light. i think its a lack of advertisers. but yes, not saying a tweet is an ad would be less transparent, but it is not false advertising. I was more referring to the fact that they allow the ads to be approved, meaning if I saw an ad that I did not approve of, I can not tweet it.

@stuart – I think they had to make the #magpie label customizable so that filters will not automatically hide all the ads. that is the type of discussion I have seen around that specific issue.

By: Stuart Robertson

Stuart Robertson — Wed, 26 Nov 2008 02:00:19 +0000

Have they really said people were asking for the #magpie, which lets people know it's an ad, to be removable? Stuart Robertson’s latest blog post..Shadow: Follow Updates Quietly on Twitter

By: Danny Brown

Danny Brown — Wed, 26 Nov 2008 01:51:27 +0000

Taking away the disclaimer that it is a Twitter advert simply makes it even less appealing. You mention Twitter users will keep the trust of the followers, but trust works both ways. If an advert isn't being preceded by a disclaimer then it's false advertising - and that would break my trust with a follower and vice versa. And the CEO of Magpie himself has already said that it's only now that they're starting to ramp up the advert frequency - I think this will soon get a lot worse and show Magpie as nothing more than a PayPerPost for Twitter. Albeit a more annoying one. Count me out. Danny Brown’s latest blog post..Drop The Retainer If You Want to Retain