The Decline of Twitter?

Since overcoming a huge $500m buyout initiative from Facebook back in 2009 twitter has increased in popularity and value.
However, it seems Twitter has been going through some serious changes recently. In Feb 2014 over $8bn of its value was wiped off as growth slowed down. Fears have risen that Twitter could follow the decline of other social networks such as MySpace and Bebo.
Users are now migrating to other social networks such as Pinterest, Snapchat, Vine, Instagram and of course, Facebook’s newest acquisition, Whatsapp.

These threatening times have encouraged Twitter to update and modernize their brand. However, these changes do seem a little influenced by the social networks that are surpassing them.

The new Twitter layout has an uncanny resemblance to Pinsterest and Facebook. It remains to be seen if this attempt of modernization will boost Twitter’s interactions.
I would argue that Twitter will continue to fade out as the current user wants two things;

• A robust and detailed social network (Facebook)

• Simple visual content: Vine, Instagram, Pinterest

Twitter doesn’t quite offer either of these trends but what it does offer is freedom of speech and the opportunity to be heard.

Lets see what 2014 holds for Twitterland.