By far the two companies I’ve written about the most recently are Apple and Twitter. This is to the delight of some people, and the absolute horror of others. And now I’ve got something that will really whip up the fanboys and enrage the haters: Me writing about Apple writing about Twitter.
Yes, Apple has a new business profile of the micro-messaging service that it put up today on its site. The headline may just say it all, “Twitter. Triumph of humanity.” But it’s actually a fairly in-depth look at how Twitter uses Apple products to conduct their business. “Pretty much everyone here at Twitter uses a Mac,” says Alex Payne, Twitter’s API lead, in the video that accompanies the profile.
Specifically, the profile is pretty much like a series of talking points about why the Mac is great for business (as you might expect in such a profile). The profile delves into OS X and how it offers just about everything Twitter needs from TextMate to Keynote. And if Twitter team members really need to boot Windows for testing purposes, they just use VMware. Also brought up is the idea that Macs are more secure than PCs. And that MacBook Airs and iPhones has given employees a new state of mind about working on the go.
“Historically, people thought about the Mac as something for entertainment or graphics, but now they see the value of the Mac as a serious business tool. The same is true of Twitter,” the profile says at one point.
But there are a few interesting tidbits. One is that the profile claims Twitter gets “heavy use” out of Numbers and Pages — two pieces of software in the iWork suite that are much less popular than their Microsoft Office counterparts, Excel and Word. Another talks about the synergy between Twitter and Apple — how the keynote address at MacWorld was a big moment in early Twitter usage history. And how Twitter is now driving a lot of development for both the Mac and iPhone with third-party clients.
The profile also claims that many of the team’s software engineers “were attracted to Twitter as an employer because of its bent for the Mac.” And that one of the reasons the office space is littered with Macs is because they are more environmentally friendly than their PC counterparts — a message Apple has been pushing heavily recently.
A quote from Twitter co-founder Biz Stone wraps up the profile, “Twitter is a minimalist communication tool that is very powerful. The Mac is the same way. It offers beautiful design, simple elegance, and a system that’s incredibly flexible and powerful to use.”
I can hear it now. The fanboys will let out a collective, “Awwww” — while the haters scream, “Get a room.”
[via Daring Fireball]
[photos via Apple]