Twitter Gets Hammered as It Opens Up to Longer Tweets

According to several media reports, Twitter Inc. (NYSE: TWTR) will allow users to tweet messages longer than the current 140 character limit. There have been rumors for months that the company would do this as a means to improve engagement and make the service more attractive to users. The market does not seem to care. The stock was off more than 2.5% early Monday to $18.60

Bloomberg reports:

According to a recent report in tech publication The Verge, Twitter Inc.’s (TWTR) social media platform will allow longer tweets today onwards by cutting “down on exactly which types of content count towards” the 140-character limit. Such content includes media attachments like images, GIFs, videos, polls etc. and quoted tweets. While Twitter itself has neither confirmed or denied the development, the publication quoted sources familiar with the company’s business

Part of the trouble with the alteration is that it does not directly address the core problems the company has, which are a lack of use growth and advertiser reluctance to use Twitter.

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As 24/7 Wall St. wrote recently:

How badly has Twitter … failed as a public company? It will have to answer that question as part of a lawsuit against it. And whatever the outcome of this case, the case for Twitter’s failure is monumental. …

Granted, user growth has died, but the real indictment against Twitter is that it has not figured a way to make money, despite being among the most famous communications networks in the world. Twitter has tried sponsored tweets, video ads, football broadcasts, lead generation and multi-image tweets. Its advertising rate card lists 12 advertising options. …

[The] case is not founded on stock price growth, but that has to be a corollary for the suit to exist. The stock is down 62% in the past five years. Over the same period, the Nasdaq is higher by 14%. It is proof that, even if the suit fails, Twitter has failed miserably.

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