Twitter reaches 5-year milestone

Twitter, the popular social networking site connecting people via posts of 140 characters or less, on Monday celebrates its fifth anniversary.

Since the first tweet, a post by Twitter co-founder Jack Dorsey, @jack, that read, "just setting up my twttr," the site has evolved into a mechanism for real-time breaking news, idle chatter and multimedia sharing used by hundreds of millions of users. The site now is valued at about $8 billion and has an average of 140 million tweets per day.

To celebrate its anniversary, Twitter, originally known as "twttr," launched a Discover Twitter Web site featuring a video of celebrities explaining why they use Twitter, including a clip of Snoop Dogg, @SnoopDogg, sharing why he follows his "home girl" Martha Stewart, @MarthaStewart.

:story: Full story: Bizjournals