Twitter may be becoming a global phenomenon but, according to Jack Dorsey, it all started with humble beginnings as an idea in his head, back in July 2000. He tells us the idea emerged when he got thinking about how to make a better real time implementation of the combination of ideas from the LiveJournal platform and the AIM status window.

Origins of Twitter

Twitter wasn’t always called Twitter. The original name for Twitter, on a sketch pad drawing was stat.us, which later evolved into twttr then evolved again into the Twitter we know today.

Early development of Twitter used the Ruby on Rails platform and the web application framework, with never more than three developers at any one time working on the project.

It took six years of pondering and experimentation for the idea of Twitter to fully emerge and take the form we are familiar with today – Jack thanks Odeo, a pod-casting company, for providing the creative environment in which the idea would develop.

Twitter is Born

It was in 2006 when Twitter was finally highlighted in the San Fransisco Chronicle as a ‘Cool Web 2.0′ website. The article wasn’t even really about Twitter – the Chronicle had talked about a Twitter competitor, Dodgeball, which had been bought by Google. Hmm, Dodgeball – anyone?

The company Obvious, LLC was formed, around October 2006, with Biz Stone, Entepreneur Evan Williams (founder of Blogger), and a number of people from Odeo to work on a number of products, including Odeo and another product which would become Twitter.

By mid 2007 so much focus was being placed on Twitter that the Odeo product lost some its focus so the team looked to find a new loving parent who would take on Odeo and allow the team to focus more fully on the Twitter product itself. At that time Odea was holding a database of three million MP3s and was experiencing millions of page views per month.

Slowly Growing

Growth was slow for Twitter in the early days, however things started moving along and on 18 April 2007, Twitter, Inc. was born. This was something of a legal technicality as Twitter was now pretty much the only product Obvious were working on. Jack Dorsey became the CEO of Twitter, Inc. and Evan Williams received the title of Co-Founder.

In March 2007 Twitter won the SXSW Web Awards and made it into the Alexa Movers and Shakers List. Twitter also made it into Time as one of the best websites of 2007.

Things Start Moving

As interest in Twitter gained pace things started to move along quite quickly for Twitter and by the end of 2008 Twitter had started to become of a global phenomenon.

Where Now?

Read about Twitter Terminology

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