Twitter considers allowing longer tweets

Twitter Inc. is considering finally relaxing its singular 140-character limit, the company’s chief executive officer Dick Costolo told hundreds of students last night at the University of Michigan’s Ross School of Business.

But we’re not supposed to tell you that.

Both the University of Michigan and the fraternity organizing last night’s event tweeted last night that Costolo’s remarks must not be quoted.

“I was just told that today’s conversation is off the record. No quotes or recordings of today’s conversation are allowed,” Jeremy Allen, who covers the university for the Ann Arbor News and MLive.com, tweeted as the session was getting underway.

That’s where Kai Petainen comes in.

A Saultite who teaches investments at the Ross School and also runs his university’s mock trading floor, Petainen is concerned about the ethics of the gag order and he has no intention of complying with it.

Petainen (shown above), says he was present and clearly heard Costolo telling students packing both levels of his school’s 500-seat Blau Auditorium in Ann Arbor that Twitter is considering allowing longer tweets.

Costolo didn’t say much about the character-length limit, but in response to a student’s question about whether he was considering relaxing it, the CEO replied that the short answer was yes, Petainen said.

For Petainen, who also writes a blog for Forbes.com, the gag on reporting what Costolo said is problematic because of the requirement that public companies inform the market of all material changes in their affairs.

“It’s incredibly material in my view,” Petainen told SooToday.com early Saturday morning.

“If I trade on it on Monday without the world knowing, I’d expect to go to jail. So I have to take the ethical high road and tell the world what I know,” he said.  

“Yes, you can quote me,” he told us. “It’s the ethical thing to do.”

Petainen says last night’s meeting raises all kinds of ethical questions.

For example, can a CEO give a speech to hundreds of people and ask that it not be quoted?

And if those people trade on information contained in that speech, is that appropriate?

This morning, Petainen indicated that he’s working on a blog that will contain more information and discussion about Costolo’s talk for Forbes.com.

And, he was peppering Twitter today with tweeted questions:

“Do you have any comment on CEO’s statements that Twitter will expand beyond the 140-character limit?”

“Do you have any comment on CEO’s seemingly bearish comments and references to large drops in Facebook and Netflix?”

“Do you have any comment on large insider sells by CEO?”
 
“Do you have any comment on how CEO spoke to a couple hundred people, but folks were told it was off the record?”

“Why can one tweet, but not tweet quotes by Twitter CEO?”


Last night’s event was organized by the students of Phi Chi Theta, a business and economics fraternity.

Costolo is a University of Michigan grad.

He gave the university’s commencement address last year.