April 2009  
  
[Om Malik](http://gigaom.com/2009/04/03/google-may-buy-twitter-or-not-but-why-
is-twitter-so-hot/) is the most recent of many people to ask why Twitter is
such a big deal.  
  
The reason is that it's a new messaging protocol, where you don't specify the
recipients. New protocols are rare. Or more precisely, new protocols that take
off are. There are only a handful of commonly used ones: TCP/IP (the
Internet), SMTP (email), HTTP (the web), and so on. So any new protocol is a
big deal. But Twitter is a protocol owned by a private company. That's even
rarer.  
  
Curiously, the fact that the founders of Twitter have been slow to monetize it
may in the long run prove to be an advantage. Because they haven't tried to
control it too much, Twitter feels to everyone like previous protocols. One
forgets it's owned by a private company. That must have made it easier for
Twitter to spread.  
  

