A lesser-known fact about the early days of popular Android apps, such as Twitter, has come to light. In a podcast interview with Sara Beykpour, former senior director of product management at Twitter and now co-founder of AI news startup Particle, it was revealed that the first versions of these apps were actually built by Google. Beykpour explained that when she joined Twitter in 2009, the company was still relatively small, employing only about 75 people. At that time, third-party apps on platforms like BlackBerry and iOS were gaining popularity. Twitter acquired one of these apps, Loren Brichter’s Tweetie, which became its first official iOS app.
Regarding the Android app, Beykpour disclosed that it was initially a demo app created by Google and given to Twitter. She explained that Google had built similar apps for other popular social media platforms as well, including Foursquare. The purpose behind this was to encourage companies to adopt Android as their preferred platform. Twitter took the Android app provided by Google and continued to develop it. Beykpour, who became the second Android engineer at Twitter, played a significant role in its development.
Interestingly, Google had written a blog post in 2010 detailing its work on the Android Twitter client. However, this information didn’t receive much press coverage at the time, so Google’s involvement in building the app remained largely forgotten. The blog post explained how Google implemented early Android best practices within the Twitter app. Beykpour revealed that Virgil Dobjanschi, the main software engineer behind the app, was available for any questions they had during the development process.
During her time at Twitter, Beykpour also worked on Vine, the video app. She faced pressure to launch Vine on Android before Instagram launched its own video product. She managed to meet this deadline by launching Vine approximately two weeks ahead of Instagram Video. However, Beykpour believes that Instagram Video’s launch significantly impacted Vine’s numbers and ultimately led to its demise. Despite Elon Musk teasing the idea of reviving Vine, Beykpour stands by Twitter’s decision to shut it down. She explains that Vine wasn’t growing and was expensive to run, ultimately affecting Twitter’s bottom line.
Beykpour also shared an intriguing anecdote about her time working on Periscope. She joined the startup just as it was acquired by Twitter, after a stint at Secret. To keep the acquisition under wraps, she had to officially rejoin Twitter using a fake name for a period of time.
Reflecting on her experience at Twitter, Beykpour discussed the challenges the company faced in developing products and features for power users, such as journalists. She noted that Twitter struggled to define its user base due to its reliance on traditional OKRs and metrics. Only a fraction of users actually tweeted, and within that fraction, only a subset was responsible for the content that most people wanted to see. This made it difficult to measure the impact of certain features.
Now at Particle, Beykpour’s experience building Twitter is informing the strategy for the AI news app. Particle aims to provide a multi-perspective view of news while also granting access to high-quality journalism. The startup is exploring alternative ways to monetize reporting beyond ads, subscriptions, or micropayments. Currently, Particle is in discussions with potential publisher partners to determine how they can be compensated for their work.
