if you’re absolutely positive you want to know more, I’ve tossed most of my findings in this GitHub issue over the past few months: https://github.com/extratone/bilge/issues/79

(if you’re familiar, you can also see alterations to my notes in the commits. if not, honestly I’m dissatisfied with them anyway lol)


how did Kayvon Bekpour become head of product at Twitter? well first, he built Periscope and really believed in it. doted on it. described it as his child. he ended up working for Twitter only because they acquired Periscope.

regarding Periscope, I should note that I believe it was the truest representation of what we all claim to desire from a social network. (it was also fundamentally a filter bubble busting device like no other.)

so… how many years later and Periscope’s founder has ascended to product decision position #1, from which he apparently decreed (perhaps two years ago? perhaps less. listen to that Nilay interview for more deets) that the remaining Periscope team cease all development on that platform and focus on reappropriating the actual technology for a Twitter-branded, audio-only live [conference call] experience.


https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/decoder-with-nilay-patel/id1011668648?i=1000512229112

Kayvon seems pretty darn forthcoming in that interview (I think I can listen again to clarify his language after all these months without getting too huffy) considering how completely unsentimental he is about cannibalizing likely the only actual innovation he’ll ever be responsible for.

((sorry, I know this is long-winded, but it’s sortof necessary to understand the level of negligence I’ve witnessed from the company this year.))

he sounds comfortable with admitting that they poached basically everyone silently from Periscope (without mentioning anything to its tens of millions of active users until the last possible second) in order to “build” Spaces.

the thing is… I think he literally took everyone. as in… nobody was at the wheel of that app - even for the most basic maintenance - for ??? before they actually announced they were shutting it down.

and what they people they did take to “build” Spaces from Periscope have been doing… were doing… nobody seems to have any fucking idea. I have continued to try/participate in Spaces ranging from just 1 friend and I chatting for an hour up to Casey Newton and Kara Swisher’s scheduled weekly show, and I can tell you that it is demonstrably and distinctly less reliable than Periscope had become even in its final months.

notably, I cannot honestly say I’ve seen any improvement in Spaces’ reliability since I first started taking notes on this (the issue is stamped march 11th.) if anything, the last one i did with my one friend - which was laggy and eventually just randomly stopped (ended) - indicates it has become less reliable.


and then there’s the thing where I’m pretty darn sure (not positive) that Twitter literally forgot to shut Periscope off for at least 5-10 days after the day they announced. I know because I set up a scope before I went to sleep of a long queue of old scopes/youtube videos of mine and when I woke up, it was still going.

and then when I checked around lunch time…. it was still going….

and by bedtime of the second night, it didn’t seem like a cool way to say goodbye anymore… and I was running out of content, so I shut mine off. there were still others broadcasting for several days after that, though.

I have felt like a maniac, dwelling on Twitter’s inability even to keep to their self-imposed deadlines, and perhaps I am, but jesus christ…. I don’t know where else to start holding them accountable. https://twitter.com/neoyokel/status/1412958943681421315

imo tech media has got to start demanding peeks in the window to see what the fuck these people are even doing.