Here in Sweden there has been a small but very active group of people microblogging using Jaiku for quite a long time. Most people were from internet startups, media and marketing industry, bloggers etc. Jonas Leijon created the first Swedish microblog service Bloggy (still in beta), which is very much like Pownce and Jaiku. The swedish word for microblogging (“mikroblogga”) become one of the official new words to the Swedish language last year.
In the US, Japan and everywhere except Sweden and Finland (Jaiku is from Finland, therefore it has more users in Finland and Sweden) Twitter has become the microblogging platform of choice, growing it’s user base much faster than the competition. All three services Jaiku, Bloggy and Twitter have had some users here in Sweden but it was not at all mainstream. Until now.
Last week, Twitter reached critical mass and spread like wildfire. Numerous people got in touch with us to report that many of their non-tech friends suddenly registered at Twitter.com. Over the course of not more than ten days, Microblogging went mainstream in Sweden.
So what happened? We blogged about how Mumbai was a big step towards mainstream for Twitter in November. We were not alone: VA, SSBD, What’s Next etc and our own blog post was actually given some national media publicity by SVD. In December there was an earthquake in SkĂ„ne here in Sweden and microblogs was of course faster than traditional media. Which gave some media publicity, again. Some journalists and others who are fast to respond to trends began to sign up for Jaiku, Twitter and Bloggy. But it still was not mainstream.
The last couple of weeks some big changes happened. Newspapers started to use Twitter, political partys and politicians too and a lot of non-tech people signed up, inviting their friends in the very tight viral loop provided by Twitter. Special hashtags only used by Swedes is another new iniative (#svpt), as well as a site dedicated to Swedish Twitter users with a list with Swedish Twitter-users and Companys/organisations in Sweden that use Twitter.
Why Twitter and not Jaiku or the Swedish alternative Bloggy.se? Jaiku’s growth is severely limited by Google requiring an invitation for new users to sign up. Pownce is gone and Bloggy is not yet very known. Even if the market seems very crowded, Twitter is actually without serious competition.
Adoption is not yet as earth-shifting as the Facebook-craze of last mid-year, but it’s a start. As Hans Kullin wrote in his blog post: The next election in Sweden is in 2010. If microblogging already is becoming mainstream, at that time microblogging has reached a large number of users here in Sweden. Is Twitter going to be as important for Swedish political parties as it was for Obama?
In our humble opinions: Undoubtedly yes.
You can follow Twingly at Twitter or join our Jaiku-channel.
I think this is kind of a good thing. I never got used to Jakius “bubble” of only web/it people. I’ve been using Twitter not for maybe a year or so and this last two weeks has been kind of crazy. As you said the #svpt hashtag has changed things a lot.
I do not understand why Jakiu still have invite only and why they do not have more API’s so that people can make applications for it. Its google .. they should know this stuff.
And about Mumbai, my collegue Markus wrote a great article about twitter and Mumbai that did not get that much attention, maybe he where to early đ
http://ohsohightech.se/internet-twitter-mumbai/
Nja, jag Ă€r inte övertygad av Jaiku eller Twitter, mest för att jag inte tycker det Ă€r intressant eller “vĂ€rt” det att mikroblogga. Det blir helt enkelt för mycket. Det jag vĂ€rdesĂ€tter med bloggar Ă€r att det leverar nĂ„got, nĂ„got vettigt. Om jag vill veta vad du eller nĂ„gon annan gör _just nu_, dĂ„ smsar jag och frĂ„gar det.
Men visst, det finns undantag.
This comment was originally posted on Kristoffer Forsgren
Jag har lÀnge anvÀnt jaiku men har pÄ slutet börjat gÄ över till twitter dÄ det funnits fler bekanta och intressanta mÀnniskor dÀr.
This comment was originally posted on Kristoffer Forsgren
Intressant att se att space.lowe.nu har kommit upp sig i vÀrlden och numera anses sÄ seriös att man kan lÀnka till den frÄn riktiga hemsidor.
Omdömeslöst, Àr vad jag skulle kalla det hela.
This comment was originally posted on Kristoffer Forsgren
LÄter lite som jag tÀnkte i början.
Visst, det ligger ju lite i det du sÀger, en blogg kan innehÄlla mer innehÄll, men det innebÀr inte att övriga kanaler inte kan vara ytterst vÀrdefulla och bidra med ganska mycket de med (Àven vettiga saker).
Jag ser det som att de har tvÄ olika funktioner. Bloggar liknar mer ett modererat diskussionsforum dÀr varje diskussion inleds med nÄgon form av framlÀggning. Mikrobloggarna Àr mer som ett sjudande gytter, dÀr diskussioner flödar pÄ ett sÀtt som pÄ mÄnga sÀtt pÄminner mer om den kommunikation som normalt sett ser mellan mÀnniskor.
Kan ju erkĂ€nna att det tog ett litet tag för mig att vĂ€nja mig vid konceptet med mikrobloggar, men jag Ă€r glad att jag “pressade” mig fram genom mitt utforskande! =)
This comment was originally posted on Kristoffer Forsgren
Hur mycket saknar du trÄd-funktionaliteten som finns pÄ Jaiku?
This comment was originally posted on Kristoffer Forsgren
Allt Ă€r relativt, jag ser det som “charmig spontanitet”. Det har sĂ„ hemskt mycket bĂ€ttre klang Ă€n “omdömeslöst”.
This comment was originally posted on Kristoffer Forsgren
Som jag sa till dig nÀr vi pratade om det. Bloggy anvÀnder jag, men jag har inte riktigt fastnat för mikrobloggande Àn
HÄller ocksÄ med Adam i sammanhanget.
This comment was originally posted on Kristoffer Forsgren
KRISTOFFER! Kan du inte spara sĂ„na hĂ€r inlĂ€gg till din “Gate” blogg? Vi icke datorfrĂ€lsta mĂ€nniskor vill inte lĂ€sa sĂ„nt hĂ€r =P Jag vill ha mer resor, vĂ€nner, familj, fest, liv, inget jĂ€kla datatjafs =P (Ta det pĂ„ rĂ€tt sĂ€tt haha)
This comment was originally posted on Kristoffer Forsgren
DZELILA!
Hej och vÀlkommen, kul att just du ville komma hit! Inte visste jag att du hade koll pÄ Gate 303
Du kan vara lugn som en filbunke, den hĂ€r bloggen kommer inte att ha samma “tekniktyngd” som Gate 303, men helt fritt frĂ„n sĂ„dant kommer det inte att vara (lite geek Ă€r man ju trots allt ;)). Skall se om jag kan försöka spexa till det med “dagens outfit” och lite sĂ„dant framöver med…
Det hÀr var mest till för att upplysa om att man Àven kan följa mitt liv pÄ Twitter och Jaiku, mikrobloggande gör det lite lÀttare att snabbt fÄ ur sig nÄgot, oavsett var man Àr, utan nÄgon som helst press pÄ att det ska vara lÄngt.
Jag ska se till att ge dig vÀnner, familj, fester och en massa annat sÄdant dÀr tjafs!
This comment was originally posted on Kristoffer Forsgren
Angaende, “which google products make money”… jag sag inte website optimizer palistan. Deras multivariate och AB testtool. Jag har anvant website optimizer pa firman jag jobbar for och var conversion gick upp i snitt 12% av 100 experiment!
This comment was originally posted on Fyra nyanser av brunt
Very interesting!I?d like to see how far he goes and how well the word will get out.,
Hey! I just searched for and I found your site!,
cool, i will bookmark it,