Twitter has just released its fourth quarter earnings for 2014, with the figures representing a mixed bag of social fruit.

Ups and downs

First the good news. Earnings are up, even exceeding expectations. 

Over the quarter Twitter took home US$479 million in revenue, a massive 97% increase year-on-year. 

This topped analysts' predictions by US$24 million.

Over the same period Twitter timeline views passed 182 billion, a rise of 23% year-on-year.

While Twitter's ad revenue per thousand timeline views is now US$2.37, a boost of 60% year-on-year. 

Numbers game

However, user figures were less impressive.

In 2014 Twitter attracted 288 million monthly active users, however just 4 million new users signed up in the fourth quarter of the year.

To put this in perspective, Facebook has over 1 billion monthly active users.

Yet no one can accuse Twitter of complacency. Last week it announced a new search deal with Google aimed at attracting more eyeballs, and recently launched While You Were Away for new users.

Stay tuned.