No IPO for Twitter soon.

"Regarding Twitter's finances, Costolo would not say whether or not the company is yet profitable,"

Sounds like a no to me.

"but he did make it sound as if the company is financially stable."

Because they have a truckload of cash.

"Costolo also said Twitter is enjoying being a private company and plans to stay that way for the foreseeable future."

How lovely for them. Meanwhile, Twitter gets noisier and I swear it freezes my browser a lot more than the days of the fail whale.

They should invest in is real time sentiment analysis http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sentiment_analysis.

Finding the trends in people's opinion in real time can give some day trading superpowers, local real time marketing capabilities and a lot more interesting things.

Does sentiment analysis work well?

I always wondered why Twitter didn't become an analytics company.

I think it's too early to say, I've heard some interesting things related to local.

I'm planning to keep an eye on the subject.

I'm curious to hear about what you learn.

Here's a game doing just that: Check out Mind of Man, the Twitter discovery game that allows players to learn more about themselves and others through crowdsourced recommendations. They've built a game layer for Twitter where players get real-world rewards for their life online.

From the site (www.mindofman.com): "Mind of Man for Twitter®, the Twitter discovery game launching globally this month, reveals how the world sees you by turning your text and behaviors into unique digital avatars. The avatars, called MindPrints, identify players’ most dominant traits and emotions relative to their friends, favorite celebrities, and the rest of the Twitterverse.

While popular social media tools rank only power or influence, Mind of Man portrays players’ online personalities, top traits and --playfully, in jest-- even character flaws or anti-social tendencies through crowdsourcing. Players earn both virtual and real-world rewards for judging sentiment."

And, it's free for iOS (iPhone/iPad on the App Store)