Twitter GURU
Indie programmer capitalizes on phenomenon
Copyright © 2009 Albuquerque Journal
By John Fleck
Journal Staff Writer
Myth No. 1 about the Internet
phenomenon known as Twitter, says Andrew Stone: It’s about telling
people you just brushed your teeth.
Far from a vehicle for the tedium of everyday life, Twitter — an Internet tool that allows users to quickly share
snippets of thoughts with their
friends or the world — is, in Stone’s view, one of the 21st century’s
great idea propagation machines.
It is also lucrative for the
53-year-old old hippie farmer in Albuquerque’s North Valley who writes
software and makes his own pickles.
Stone will not disclose his income from selling software for Twitter users beyond a sheepish “definitely
in the six figures,” followed by a
smile. The smile is followed a few minutes later by a tour of the
sprawling garden where Twitter software development and other related
enterprises support Stone’s passion for growing the ingredients for his
homemade pickles.
Like many aficionados, Stone has a
difficult time explaining Twitter, which is used in many ways by many
people. But he can remember the precise moment he realized its power.
It was April 2008, when he read a
news story about James Karl Buck, a University of California student
arrested at a demonstration in Egypt. He used his cell phone to send a
series of text messages to his Twitter friends, who quickly organized
to arrange his release from jail.
“I said, ‘This is so cool,’ ” Stone
recalled, and set to work writing software to help Twitter users
navigate the world of information it offers.
For people who live on the
Internet, Twitter has become a killer app, tailored to a fastmoving,
always-on style of communication. Links and ideas can be quickly
shared. The most interesting get passed on from user to user in a
custom known as “re-tweeting,” meaning the most interesting to users
can spread like wildfire.
A 1977 University of New
Mexico architecture grad, Stone was
one of the first generation to use Apple’s Macintosh, the computer that
brought pointand-click to the masses. More important, though, was a
little tool called HyperCard that allowed end users to write their own
little programs.
“Finally a regular person could program a Mac,” Stone said.
The term “hacker” in pop culture
has come to be associated with ill-behaved teenagers using the Internet
to break into other people’s computers. To computing purists, though,
“hacker” has an entirely dif
ferent meaning — a term of respect for people clever at the art and science of getting computers to do useful work.
Stone became a HyperCard hacker in
the best sense of the word, and a career in software development was
born. Software to edit pictures, make movies and create Web pages has
followed over the years.
The work generated a stream of
revenue sufficient to expand his little patch of the North Valley,
where Stone has built a sprawling workshop, a guesthouse and a
two-story tower that houses a warren of computers with a water tank on
the roof to irrigate the family’s sprawling garden.
Today, the action happens in
Stone’s little iPhone, the mobile phone developed by Apple that is
really a powerful computer in the pocket. The iPhone — always there,
always on — is a platform tailor-made for Twitter, and for
“Twittelator,” the software Stone developed for Twitter users.
For $4.99 — free for a
stripped-down version — users can download Twittelator to help them
manage their Twitter lives. Users send messages with it and use it to
organize and keep track of the steady stream of messages coming from
all their Twitter friends. Twittelator makes it easy to share pictures
or links to interesting Web sites.
Apple keeps 30 percent, and Stone
gets the rest. More than half-a-million people have downloaded
Twittelator in its various versions, along with several other iPhone
programs Stone has written.
For an independent programmer, with
a garden outside with fresh asparagus demanding his attention, it is
close to the perfect life.
“I don’t worry about sales. I don’t
worry about collecting money. I don’t worry about anything. I just
code,” Stone said. “It’s the indie garage guy’s dream.”
Latest trend
Twitter allows users to send short
messages, called “tweets,” from computers or cell phones to anyone who
wants to read them. Limit is 140 characters. Users can also sign up to
read tweets sent by anyone, whether it’s a friend, family or tweeting
celebrities like Oprah Winfrey. Sign up at twitter. com to send or
receive.
[참고자료]
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