"If you are an existing developer of client apps, you can continue to serve your user base,"
"Twitter has to revoke literally hundreds of API tokens / apps a week as part of our trust and safety efforts, in order to protect the user experience on our platform. " Does this mean twitter is no longer granting request Tokens to Third Party Applications?....cause i keep getting a 401 when i try to get one... --Chidi On Mar 11, 9:18 pm, Ryan Sarver <rsar...@twitter.com> wrote: > Hey all, I’d like to give you an update about the state of the Twitter > Platform and hopefully provide some much requested guidance. > > Since this time last year, Twitter use has skyrocketed. We’ve grown from 48 > million to 140 million tweets a day and we’re registering new accounts at an > all-time record. This massive base of users, publishers, and businesses is > a giant playground for developers to build their own businesses on, and this > means the opportunity has grown for everyone. > > With more people joining Twitter and accessing the service in multiple ways, > a consistent user experience is more crucial than ever. As we talked about > last April, this was our motivation for buying Tweetie and developing our > own official iPhone app. It is the reason why we have developed official > apps for the Mac, iPad, Android and Windows Phone, and worked with RIM on > their Twitter for Blackberry app. As a result, the top five ways that people > access Twitter are official Twitter apps. > > Still, our user research shows that consumers continue to be confused by the > different ways that a fractured landscape of third-party Twitter clients > display tweets and let users interact with core Twitter functions. For > example, people get confused by websites or clients that display tweets in a > way that doesn’t follow our design guidelines, or when services put their > own verbs on tweets instead of the ones used on Twitter. Similarly, a > number of third-party consumer clients use their own versions of suggested > users, trends, and other data streams, confusing users in our network even > more. Users should be able to view, retweet, and reply to @nytimes’ tweets > the same way; see the same profile information about @whitehouse; and be > able to join in the discussion around the same trending topics as everyone > else across Twitter. > > *A Consistent User Experience* > Twitter is a network, and its network effects are driven by users seeing and > contributing to the network’s conversations. We need to ensure users can > interact with Twitter the same way everywhere. Specifically: > - *The mainstream consumer client experience*. Twitter will provide the > primary mainstream consumer client experience on phones, computers, and > other devices by which millions of people access Twitter content (tweets, > trends, profiles, etc.), and send tweets. If there are too many ways to use > Twitter that are inconsistent with one another, we risk diffusing the user > experience. In addition, a number of client applications have repeatedly > violated Twitter’s Terms of Service, including our user privacy policy. > This demonstrates the risks associated with outsourcing the Twitter user > experience to third parties. Twitter has to revoke literally hundreds of > API tokens / apps a week as part of our trust and safety efforts, in order > to protect the user experience on our platform. > - *Display of tweets in 3rd-party services*. We need to ensure that tweets, > and tweet actions, are rendered in a consistent way so that people have the > same experience with tweets no matter where they are. For example, some > developers display “comment”, “like”, or other terms with tweets instead of > “follow, favorite, retweet, reply” - thus changing the core functions of a > tweet. > > With this in mind, we’ve updated our Terms of > Service:http://dev.twitter.com/pages/api_terms. > > *The Opportunity for Developers* > Developers have told us that they’d like more guidance from us about the > best opportunities to build on Twitter. More specifically, developers ask > us if they should build client apps that mimic or reproduce the mainstream > Twitter consumer client experience. The answer is no. > > If you are an existing developer of client apps, you can continue to serve > your user base, but we will be holding you to high standards to ensure you > do not violate users’ privacy, that you provide consistency in the user > experience, and that you rigorously adhere to all areas of our Terms of > Service. We have spoken with the major client applications in the Twitter > ecosystem about these needs on an ongoing basis, and will continue to ensure > a high bar is maintained. > > As we point out above, we need to move to a less fragmented world, where > every user can experience Twitter in a consistent way. This is already > happening organically - the number and market share of consumer client apps > that are not owned or operated by Twitter has been shrinking. According to > our data, 90% of active Twitter users use official Twitter apps on a monthly > basis. > > In contrast, the number of successful applications and companies in the > Twitter ecosystem that focus on areas outside of the mainstream consumer > client experience has grown quickly, and this is a trend we want to continue > to support and help grow. Twitter will always be a platform on which a > smart developer with a great idea and some cool technology can build a great > company of his or her own. And, with record user growth, there has never > been a better time to build into Twitter. > > Some key areas where ecosystem developers are thriving: > - *Publisher tools*. Companies such as > SocialFlow<http://www.socialflow.com/>help publishers optimize how > they use Twitter, leading to increased user > engagement and the production of the right tweet at the right time. > - *Curation*. Mass Relevance <http://www.massrelevance.com/> and > Sulia<http://www.sulia.com/>provide services for large media brands to > select, display, and stream the > most interesting and relevant tweets for a breaking news story, topic or > event. > - *Realtime data signals*. Hundreds of companies use real-time Twitter > data as an input into ranking, ad targeting, or other aspects of enhancing > their own core products. Klout <http://klout.com/> is an example of a > company which has taken this to the next level by using Twitter data to > generate reputation scores for individuals. Similarly, > Gnip<http://gnip.com/>syndicates Twitter data for licensing by third > parties who want to use our > real-time corpus for numerous applications (everything from hedge funds to > ranking scores). > - *Social CRM, entreprise clients, and brand insights*. Companies such as > HootSuite <http://hootsuite.com/>, CoTweet <http://cotweet.com/>, > Radian6<http://www.radian6.com/>, > Seesmic <http://seesmic.com/>, and Crimson > Hexagon<http://www.crimsonhexagon.com/>help brands, enterprises, and > media companies tap into the zeitgeist about > their brands on Twitter, and manage relationships with their consumers using > Twitter as a medium for interaction. > - *Value-added content and vertical experiences*. Emerging services like > Formspring <http://www.formspring.me/>, Foursquare <http://foursquare.com/>, > Instagram <http://instagr.am/>, and Quora <http://www.quora.com/> have built > into Twitter by allowing users to share unique and valuable content to their > followers, while, in exchange, the services get broader reach, user > acquisition, and traffic. > > A lot of Twitter’s success is attributable to a diverse ecosystem of more > than 750,000 registered apps. We will continue to support this innovation. > We are excited to be working with our developer community to create a > consistent and innovative experience for the many millions of users who have > come to depend on Twitter every day. > > As always, we welcome your feedback and questions. > > Best, Ryan > @rsarver <http://twitter.com/rsarver> -- Twitter developer documentation and resources: http://dev.twitter.com/doc API updates via Twitter: http://twitter.com/twitterapi Issues/Enhancements Tracker: http://code.google.com/p/twitter-api/issues/list Change your membership to this group: http://groups.google.com/group/twitter-development-talk
