Twitter's growing ranks continue to swell practically every Monday this year, and today is no exception, as the blue birded microblogging service added four more to its arsenal today with an interesting mix of well-known tech faces and a curveball, also taking on an executive from a franchise furniture store in San Francisco. The latest hires take the company's full-time roster closer to 150, and swell the number being followed on their official list to more than 170.

Last night, you could see three of the four new hires getting what they called "first day of school anticipation" jitters, as Bryan Haggerty, who championed LinkedIn's mobile development, saw his excitement echoed first by Isaac Hepworth, most recently at Google, and finally by Kristen Cordle, who left Yahoo! earlier this month, getting a goodbye hug from co-founder Jerry Yang.



The three new hires from LinkedIn, Google and Yahoo! are also joined by Caroline Quick, who along with her husband, Josh, built out a furniture business, called EQ3, which launched in 2003 and started to take off the following year. Caroline's LinkedIn profile describes how she oversaw the build-out of two multi-million dollar retail locations in San Francisco and Emeryville, which are the company's top performing stores in North America.


Haggerty's role at LinkedIn, and subsequent move to Twitter, was highlighted by TechCrunch at the end of February, describing his move to Twitter's mobile team.


Isaac Hepworth, who left Google at the end of January after 3 1/2 years there, didn't spend much time on a planned break, announcing his joining Twitter in mid-February. He starts today as a product manager for Twitter after his role at Google as a group program manager focused on partner solutions. Products he impacted while at Google included AdSense, Android and YouTube.

Kristen joins Twitter as an executive assistant to Evan Williams, according to her LinkedIn profile. She was previously executive assistant to Carol Bartz, Yahoo! CEO, and prior to Bartz, she held the same role working with the since-departed Sue Decker.

Despite Isaac's addition and the fact that both Biz and Ev hailed from Blogger, part of Google, Twitter hasn't become completely dominated by former Googlers, as we have seen hires join the company from practically every major tech company since the beginning of the year, including Facebook, Microsoft, Ning, IBM, Six Apart and others as well. The wide array of backgrounds should make for interesting discussions as the company makes strategic decisions going forward.

Editor's Note: A previous version did not denote Kristen Cordle's role and background, which has now been included.

BackType, the best comments search engine on the Web, which launched in 2008 and has since morphed to act as a "real-time, conversational" search engine, today announced the introduction of BackType Labs, an "in progress" look at some of their newer projects. The first to debut is a service called BackType Me, which aims to find out what content is being shared by people you follow on Twitter.

Funded by Y! Combinator, BackType has grown from its two cofounders to a team of three, and is actively looking to hire two more engineers, focused on software and search. In the last few months, the threesome has evolved the site to display news by category, such as "Technology", "Politics" or "Entertainment", and has grown closer to Twitter, displaying topics that are "Hot Right Now", much like Twitter's trending topics.

Now, searching BackType displays shared items from friends as well, which feeds the BackType Me product. Search BackType for a specific term (for example, the Oscars) and if logged in, you can see which of your connections shared a specific article on Twitter. The core BackType Me service displays all content shared in your social circle, and highlights the individuals who have shared it.

BackType Me could be a quick way to scan important items shared on social sites from friends in your network, and I assume we can expect more to come from BackType Labs. The team is already hinting at something called "BT.IO", which could be yet another URL shortener or something else entirely. We'll be watching them at work in the Labs when it debuts.

Facebook is huge in practically every way measurable. The site sports more than 400 million active users, and just passed Yahoo! for the 2nd most trafficked site on the Web, made even more impressive by the number of hours each active user on the site spends using the platform each month. The company's Facebook Connect product is setting itself up as a challenger to represent your identity online, and many anticipate the company taking on PayPal or other products for online transactions. But even more than the raw numbers, the impact Facebook has, from sharing, to members' gestures, to the act of friending and unfriending, cannot be overstated. For while many of us digerati get all atwitter about newer, shinier objects, the mainstream Web has made Facebook their central gathering place to talk with casual friends, family members, and even talk business. Now, activities online affect those offline, and offline events directly impact a response on Facebook.


About a year ago, I said Facebook's success made it the social media prism and translator, by which all newer tools could be described. But as the site adds functionality and sheer mass, it's possible that could render many of its potential challengers irrelevant.

Even as I try service after service, or single-use products, those in my family who have made the Web less of a central point in their lives have taken to Facebook in a way unseen with any other product. While my family has generally been among the faster to adopt other platforms, like e-mail, or even blogging, Facebook has become the central point where messages are sent, photos are shared, updates are given, and offline relationships are mirrored. Now, rather than making phone calls to see how everyone is doing, it can be a lot easier to check one's Facebook status, read their Wall, and see what other friends of theirs are saying. And when we do meet face to face, we can reference what we've seen on Facebook, instead of starting with an empty slate.


As with most families, ours occasionally has bumps. Marriages show cracks, and siblings fight, just like any other unit. When one couple was rumored to be talking of splitting, it became even more official when the in-law unfriended all of the other's siblings and relatives, making a clean break. When friend requests came from the crazy aunt who had ridiculous political leanings, it was declined. And people internally squabble about why one sibling's photos get a ton of comments, but another's don't.

I have seen and heard many similar conversations in families everywhere. What seems to be happening, as Facebook becomes THE default social network, where people are expected to be connected, and always listening, is that other sites become utilities for specific functions. Google is used as a search utility. Yahoo! becomes a news site or finance hub. ESPN is for sports. But Facebook has become that go-to site that absorbs what many other sites used to. It has become the platform for sharing photos, the platform for messaging, the platform for casual games, and personal connections. Its continued growth and visibility reinforces this position, as over time, the Facebook hold outs join up and get connected.

I may prefer Google Buzz and FriendFeed and Twitter and SmugMug and all these other best-of-breed sites for their specific use cases, but thus far, I haven't been able to convert the family to converge with me there. Facebook is rapidly becoming the Web platform with external services feeding in, and it feeding out. It becomes the conduit, but also the destination.

As mentioned on Monday, Twitter introduced firehose access to their API for seven new partners. This evening, Chris Saad, Mashable's Ben Parr and I discussed the announcement of Twitter’s new API partnerships and implications for the company's revenue, developer and user communities.

Is this approach competitive or cooperative with the community, and how is their model likely to change over time?

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