This post is a bit dated now – I had planned to publish it on the day of the Jaiku news but it slipped somehow!
I’ve never really thought that the sale of Jaiku to Google was because of being a Twitter competitor. Google isn’t in that game – they think alot more expansive than that. Jaiku is much more than Twitter as it has at its heart location and prezence – something that Google is pressing strongly in all of its apps. Taking this quote by the founder of Jaiku in consideration, we might just see the intended use of Jaiku.
In Jyri’s words:
Soon, anyone, for free and with little effort, will be able to install and modify the Jaiku code, launch it on App Engine, and run their own microblogging platform. Combine that decentralization with standards such as OAuth and the forthcoming activity stream standards, and what we’re seeing here is the accelerating trend away from microblogging being a destination to microblogging being a pervasive and ubiquitous part of the fabric of the web itself.
Let’s wait and see, but I for one am curious to find out.