Twitter Growth Stalls, Study Shows Just 10% Tweet

Just last week, Twitter was on the cover of Time; today, everyone’s crowing about its demise, writes Om Malik for GigaOm. According to Compete.com, Twitter’s unique visitor growth stalled in May after months of sensational gains, up a mere 1.47% compared to Facebook’s 8%. The BBC reported that 90% of Tweets are written by just 10% of users. Plus, the “Twitpocalypse”—in which the growing number of tweets could crash the system designed to keep track of them—is nigh.

But don’t write Twitter’s obituary yet, Malik warns. The 80/20 rule—80% of users consume, 20% create—is typical for social sites and fine for Twitter, and the Twitpocalypse feels very Y2K. Indeed, Stan Schroeder, on Mashable, finds some good signs in the number of minutes spent on Twitter: They’re up a mind-boggling 3,712% from April 2008 to April 2009, topping Facebook’s 699% growth. (More Twitter stories.)