What will we call a Twitter?

Friday, March 13, 2009 by Dave Winer.

Here's a TechFlash piece where a Google exec talks about a Twitter-like service. "There's relatively little data in Twitter," Bershad said. "I think if you could take a Twitter-like service and combine it with a lot of other data sources about the users, you might be able to come up with something more interesting." 

He's thinking about having his own twitter.  

Interesting! 

Leo Laporte already has one. 

http://army.twit.tv/  

So do I. (Though far more humble than Leo's.) 

http://home.smallpicture.com/  

As you read those sentences, does something bother you?  

Pause for a moment and think about it before you read on. 

We're using the word twitter in a new way. 

Up till now it was a company and a service.  

Is it a trademark? Curiously there's nothing on the site (that I can find) that indicates that it is.  

So here's the question. 

If you accept the premise that some day there will be many twitter-like services, that it will be common for blogs to have their own community twitter like Leo and I do. And that corporations will have twitters for coordinating projects (narrating your work). That there will be services that are competitive with the original Twitter, perhaps from Google and Facebook, and others. If you accept some of these premises, then the question is -- what will they be called? 

Will they be called microblogging services, which is the current nomenclature among techies, or will people take the shortest path and call a twitter a twitter? 

Curious to know what people think. 

PS: Unrelated, Paul Andrews just sent a screen shot of his Twitter page with an active search box.