Most of us browse the Internet with no particular aim --- sort of window shopping. Suddenly something strikes as interesting and we plunge in to cull information and Tweet it.

Bringing a Smarter Search to Twitter, With Fees

By TODD WOODY
Published: April 11, 2010,  New York  Times

Bill Gross, the serial entrepreneur who pioneered search advertising, is unveiling a venture on Monday that aims to make money by allowing people using Twitter to bid on key words to give their posts top ranking.

TweetUp will organize posts according to their popularity.

TweetUp, will also organize the posts according to their popularity as measured by how often readers repost them and click on links they contain.

Mr. Gross said he had signed deals with other outside Twitter services like Seesmic, TwitterFeed and Twidroid to display TweetUp’s rankings.

A TweetUp search bar will appear on Web sites like Answers.com and BusinessInsider.com.

TweetUp will split revenue evenly with each partner, he said.

The goal is to cut through the clutter of thousands of irrelevant posts on topics of interest and keep the useful ones from disappearing into a torrent of messages.

The gamble is whether Twitter users who have turned the microblogging service into global communications phenomenon will be willing to pay to get their 140-character messages noticed — and whether other Twitter users will view such paid placement as legitimate.

“We feel Twitter is unbelievably powerful, but finding the thoughtful tweets amid all the noise is unbelievably hard,” said Mr. Gross, founder of Idealab, a technology company incubator based in Pasadena, Calif. “What we’re bringing is a new sort-order to tweets.”

TweetUp has raised $3.5 million from a group of investors.

Here is how the service will work.

People can bid on key words or phrases, like “iPad” or “solar energy,” to push their Twitter profile or posts to the top of TweetUp’s rankings. Bids begin at 1 cent and people will pay each time their profile or a post shows up in a search.

Mr. Gross stressed that bids were not required to appear in search results. The service will also calculate rankings based on an algorithm that uses data from a company called Klout that measures a Twitter user’s influence. Bit.ly, a service that shortens Web addresses for display on Twitter, will provide data on how often people click on a link in a post.

So who does Mr. Gross expect to pay to put something as ephemeral as a Twitter post on top of the charts? “I think everyone who is looking to build a following will pay,” he said. That means companies that want to build their brands as well as individuals who hope to drive readers to their Web sites.

“The big bet, of course, is whether people are going to adopt it.”

Most of us browse the Internet with no particular aim --- sort of window shopping.

Suddenly something strikes  as interesting and we plunge in to cull information and Tweet it.

And a person who likes it begin to follow the writer. 

A group of like-minded people follow each other.

Just as in Clipmarks.  That's all about it,  a matter of sharing tid bits !

Would any Tweeter in a Developing country pay,   by any chance ?

New York Times full report could be read here
Not a Dog's chance !

Posted via email from What's New in Internet Today !