"We have to put the product and the service that we're building first," Dorsey said in an exclusive interview with DailyFinance today after he spoke at New York University. "If it's better in the hands of another organization that can add support, then, yes, I mean, that's something I'd consider."
He'd rather not sell the fast-growing micro-blogging service, he said. Although costs are increasing as Twitter users multiply, Dorsey feels the San Francisco-based company has enough money to "be patient" about having to create revenue.
Twitter's board, which has six members and meets every six weeks, isn't looking for a certain amount of money in order to sell to the highest bidder or best workplace fit, Dorsey said. Google (GOOG), Apple (AAPL) and Microsoft (MSFT) have been the rumored potential buyers in recent months.
"We feel that we can build something that is sustainable independently and that is the fastest and best way that we can move," he told DailyFinance after speaking with other panelists at NYU about the future of media as part of the Internet Week New York conference. Other speakers on the panel included Craig Newmark, founder of Craigslist.com and Alan Murray, deputy managing editor of the Wall Street Journal. Murry told the panel that the Journal likes the traffic Twitter and others provide, which DailyFinance's Jeff Bercovici wrote about here.
The micro-blogging service is a labor of love for Dorsey and his co-founders Biz Stone and Evan Williams, who is also the company's chief executive. That said, money is a need and an issue as the company serves more users.
"We raised enough money so that we could be patient," Dorsey said, and to get to the point where the company makes enough money to sustain its own growth.
In the past week, Twitter CEO Williams told The Wall Street Journal's Walt Mossberg that he'll still be running the company in five years and told CNBC that if the Twitter founders wanted to sell, they'd have sold by now.
Since Twitter is bringing in little revenue, whether the company has enough money to sustain its rapid growth is "an open question," Dorsey said. "We're not really sure. The usage is really taking a lot of resources right now and that doesn't seem to be stopping."
In the meantime, Dorsey and the Twitter management team is micro-focused on the "atomic unit" that is the 140 characters that make up a Tweet. Whether the company sells or not isn't the primary focus for Twitter.
"We're just open to whatever is best for the product and service," Dorsey said in the interview. "Ideally, we'd like to sustain it through revenue. But we might need to take more money."
Whether Twitter ever needs to put up a "for sale" sign to raise more money, Dorsey simply said, "I hope not."
Anthony Massucci is a senior writer for DailyFinance. You may follow him on Twitter at hianthony.
