Recently when Apple announced the integration of Twitter into iOS 5 at the World Wide Developer Conference, the collaboration itself was not that surprising but the extent to which Twitter was being integrated evoked some surprise. All the apps which will come pre-installed with the iOS 5 devices, will provide the option to share with Twitter. Users will be able to share their location to other users as well.
The popularity of Twitter is without question, but some analysts have been left wondering why Facebook did not get the same honour, as the later appears to be way ahead in the social media game.
Talking about the iOS 5 and Twitter integration itself, it runs so deep that Apple has included ‘Install Now” link in the settings application itself so the users may go on to App Store to get the official free Twitter app for iOS. Even new users may register themselves natively on their iOS devices.
The Windows Phone 7 handsets already have Facebook in the People Hub, whereas Android manages users’ Facebook contacts with the usual phonebook contacts. On any iOS 5 device, whenever users download an app, they will asked to share their Twitter details, which is an advantage for Twitter.
According to reports, Apple and Facebook do not get along well with each other. At one point, Facebook shut off Apple’s social network Ping from accessing its user base and even Steve Jobs termed the Facebook’s terms of working together as ‘onerous’. The good working relationship shared by Facebook with Microsoft also doesn’t help matters either, since Apple has always competed against Microsoft.
The Apple move to connect Twitter deep into the iOS 5 seems to be very smart since the company realises the social networking business is not their core competence whereas Twitter gets it really well. Twitter sees itself as a mobile friendly company, so integration with iOS does not seem out of line for it.