twitter.jpgToday’s papers are reporting that Twitter is about raise $100 million from venture firms, an infusion of cash that would value the company –– which not only has never turned a profit, but doesn’t even seem to have any revenue — at a whopping $1 billion.

As the New York Times‘s Brad Stone explains:

For context, that is almost double the market capitalization of Domino’s Pizza, which has 10,500 employees and had $1.4 billion in sales last year.

I love Twitter. But I fear that we’ve seen this movie before — and it doesn’t have a happy ending.

3 Responses to “Factoid of the day: Irrational twitxuberance?”

  1. Gael Lynch says:

    I totally agree–love Twitter, great for following news and interests, family and friends. But! There’s an awful lot of us crowding that limb. Will we all stay there? People are migrating away from Face Book in droves, I think. Not so sure I’d want to invest in it…a little too tipsy for me! (I sure could be wrong though!)

  2. It does have a happy ending if you’re the initial investors, who will likely make a ridiculously rich IRR when this gets bought by Google, or more likely, News Corp.

    What would be an interesting comparison is how many subscribers of Twitter versus how many pizzas get bought at Dominoes. Is Twitter’s subscriber worth more than someone who buys a pizza? Are your thoughts worth more than your hunger?

  3. Dan, I’m as scared as you about that…

    BUT it should give us confidence. You may think your idea is weird or bad because you’re not sure what the revenue model is…Screw it! Apparently investors don’t care.

    “Social media?! Who do I make the cheque out to?”

    They only way I can see investors getting their money back is if they make enough noise and get gobbled by a big fish.

    Scott, are fluff tweets more valuable than an all cheese pizza? Hmmmm. Well their equally as nutritious – that’s for sure.