Twitter buys posterous.... Eliminating competition or capturing talent?

Many commentators such as Don Martelli, think this acquisition is to get the talent at Posterous, to help design a better interface for Twitter. More here > - I think it's more complicated than that, although it is the company line as reported in the telegraph > and on Twitters own blog >

Part of the issue is that twitter is seeing competition in key demographics from Tumblr >, an older and more flexible compact blogging engine that has aspects of twitter that some groups like, It's scored strongly in fan arenas and those who share a variety of media directly, video, sound, `and photo's and text all co-exist more comfortably on Tumblr.

The long play is dominance in the market, Twitter maximises its value by being the only short form conversation medium in town and this acquisition is aimed at tightening their grip. One thing is certain, Tumblr won't do nothing, watch carefully.

The game is getting warmer again. We'll all see more change, 2012 is looking like the year big internet acquisitions drive change rather than organic growth, driven in part by the disruptions that google plus has brought to what had become a rather uneventful market.

William Buist
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