Apple shuts down Topsy, the social media analytics firm it acquired 2 years ago
“We’ve searched our last tweet.” So goes the farewell announcement, as it were, made on Twitter by Topsy.
The apparent shutdown of Topsy comes just a couple of years after the social media analytics firm was acquired by Apple for more than $200 million.
Described as being like Google for social media, the now defunct company focused mainly on analyzing data from Twitter. In fact, it was one of only a handful of certified Twitter partners. As such, it was able to search, index and analyze tweets dating back to Twitter’s very beginning in 2006.
Staying true to its code of secrecy, Apple declined to reveal its plans with Topsy’s technology when it was discovered to have purchased the analytics firm. But speculations abounded pointing toward the likelihood that Apple would be using the data mined by Topsy in improving its targeted-marketing strategy on iAds and its search algorithms across iTunes, the App Store, Siri, and more.
And Apple may have actually tapped into Topsy’s technology to enhance at least its search offerings on iOS: Topsy’s homepage now redirects to Apple’s support document on using Search on iOS, which allows searching for content from the Web, contacts, apps, nearby places and more, and features proactive Siri suggestions.
Topsy’s fitting farewell tweet is the firm’s first tweet since its acquisition by Apple in late 2013 — and, by all accounts, its last ever.
We've searched our last tweet.
— Topsy (@Topsy) December 16, 2015
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