diff --git a/app/models/status_message.rb b/app/models/status_message.rb
index 1834c56e5..50fd79ea7 100644
--- a/app/models/status_message.rb
+++ b/app/models/status_message.rb
@@ -14,7 +14,7 @@ class StatusMessage < Post
   acts_as_taggable_on :tags
   extract_tags_from :raw_message
 
-  validates_length_of :text, :maximum => 10000, :message => I18n.t('status_messages.too_long', :count => 10000)
+  validates_length_of :text, :maximum => 65535, :message => I18n.t('status_messages.too_long', :count => 65535)
   xml_name :status_message
   xml_attr :raw_message
 
diff --git a/spec/models/status_message_spec.rb b/spec/models/status_message_spec.rb
index 6773e69c6..5a0319bf3 100644
--- a/spec/models/status_message_spec.rb
+++ b/spec/models/status_message_spec.rb
@@ -116,9 +116,9 @@ describe StatusMessage do
     db_status.text.should == message
   end
 
-  it 'should require status messages to be less than 10000 characters' do
+  it 'should require status messages to be less than 65535 characters' do
     message = ''
-    10001.times{message = message +'1'}
+    65535.times{message = message +'1'}
     status = Factory.build(:status_message, :text => message)
 
     status.should_not be_valid