Twitter bans third-party apps; Tweetbot and Twitterrific end activities
Twitter continues its drive to control as much of its network as possible. The latest project puts apps like Tweetbot and Twitterrific in a tricky situation, which is already resulting in the closure of its activities. That’s because the social network of the bird began blocking third-party apps on Friday (13), possibly to force the use of their own customers.
In the words of a post on twitterrific’s official blog, the service was discontinued:
We regret to say that the sudden and unworthy end of the app is due to an unannounced and undocumented policy change by an increasingly whimsical Twitter – a Twitter that we no longer recognize as reliable and do not want to work anymore.
The message follows something that was possible to deduce since Elon Musk’s social network began blocking third-party apps: the end of many services outside the CEO bubble. It is worth pointing out that Twitterrific is one of the forerunners on the platform, emerging in 2007.
However, there are others who are also falling.
Tweetbot co-creator Paul Haddad told TechCrunch that the company has already removed the Mac customer from the App Store. Next will be the turn of the iOS version.
TweenApp, which promised to make the use of the page more casual and comfortable, was succinct in saying that “it was closing the curtains” and thanked people for using the product.
Another who commented on the difficulties was the Talon, which is used to customize the timeline and remove ads. In their profile on the bird, the team stated that “it will stop working because Twitter does not allow access to application services that attempt to recreate the platform experience.”
Change in rules came days later
The main surprise for developers and users is that the change in the rules came “out of nowhere”. There wasn’t an announcement or any prior request for apps to adapt to the changes (even if that would be basically impossible).
The Twitter Profile Dev, for example, pointed out that the suspension of third-party applications occurred because the company is applying API rules, but none of them were presented. Obviously, this caused more confusion.
However, on Thursday (19), the social network of the bird changed the terms for developers. Thus, the sentence I need to highlight is in the second part:
You won’t or will try (and won’t allow others to do it)… use or access the Licensed Materials to create or attempt to create a replacement or product or product similar to the Twitter Applications
That is, there is no way a third-party app like Tweetbot or Talon survives this.
Third-party apps are part of the ecosystem
Whether Elon Musk likes it or not, apps like Twitterrific and Echofon are very popular on the platform. Many users had them as pieces of great importance for the day to day, allowing them to customize their timeline or preventing them from seeing information they did not want.
The closure of this ecosystem can drive away even more tweeters, who have been feeling that the social network is no longer the same in which they have spent so many hours of their lives. As a result, a new stampede eventually occurs.
Having a smaller amount of users is not something the Twitter CEO would like, especially at such a critical time. It is worth remembering that the company is in financial difficulties and that there are clear signs of a possible bankruptcy.