Today at Twitter headquarters in San Francisco, Russian President Dmitry Medvedev stopped by. To say security was tight here is putting it lightly. I had to go through a process much more stringent than any airport I’ve ever been to just to get in. There are snipers here. Not kidding.
So why was Medvedev here? To send his first tweet, of course.
Twitter co-founder Evan Williams kicked things off by welcoming everyone (there is a ton of foreign press here). Co-founder Biz Stone then took the mic and said that this was “one of the most special days in the history of Twitter.”
“We believe that the open exchange of information can have a positive impact,” Stone went on. “We hope you’ll consider us your friend,” Stone said to applause.
Medvedev then stepped up to the computer and sent out his first tweet (in Russian, naturally). It translates roughly in English to “Hello everyone, I’m now on Twitter and this is my first message.” (And it includes a typo — the “6” — very appropriate for a tweet.)
He then sent a second one, noting that Silicon Valley was beautiful, and that he’d be visiting companies like Apple, Cisco, and Yandex (a Russian IT company) as well on his trip.
Not surprisingly, Medvedev’s Twitter followers are surging. When I first loaded up his account he had 2 followers — now he has 1,500 just minutes later.
President Medvedev is in the U.S. to meet with U.S. President Barack Obama tomorrow in Washington. He’ll also be meeting with Google CEO Eric Schmidt. San Francisco mayor Gavin Newsom was also here at the event today.
[photos: flickr/twitteroffice]