I agree with the fact that it would be a good thing for the api developers to get as a tidbit, but if I were at Twitter Product I would decline this because it adds complexity to the registration process that does not translate to value for the users on twitter.com. If I am a one man shop design firm who does work with Nike, do you really want me to have to sit there and decide whether I am a "person" or a "business"? And after I have run the numbers and decided I am a business, my tone might be affected because I am now speaking on behalf oy "my business". It affects the core nature of twitter and doesnt give the user much. I think the definition of a business on twitter will emerge from companies paying twitter to be identified as such. Paying a premium on an identity itself validates the level of business, and twitter can then expsoe the social graph of the "businesses" on twitter. You then create a scenario where all those who want to clearly identify their species can do so in a non-intrusive manner that does not affect Jane User's, just-saw-Oprah-and-ready-to-tweet registration process.
always just an opinion On Thu, May 28, 2009 at 12:15 PM, MPS <[email protected]> wrote: > > Sure, someone could develop a service for classifying twitter > accounts, but that's less than ideal for a number of reasons: > > - introduces yet another 3rd party service that developers have to > deal with > - multiple account classification systems would result in less > meaningful data > - Twitter is the only company in a position to enable users to > classify themselves - they could just make this a required dropdown in > their signup form. > > I really think it would be enough just to have a flag that marks > accounts as "Personal". Marking an account as Personal that is in fact > used primarily for commercial purposes or driven by a bot could be > considered a violation of Twitter's TOS. > > This would add huge value to users & developers. I hope someone @ > Twitter is listening! > > On May 27, 11:34 am, Chad Etzel <[email protected]> wrote: > > Need to classify a twitter account? There's an app for that! ...maybe > > -Chad > > > > On Wed, May 27, 2009 at 11:26 AM, Abraham Williams <[email protected]> > wrote: > > > Sounds like a third party app to me. > > > > > 2009/5/27 Adam Covati <[email protected]> > > > > >> Hmm, could definitely be of some use. Of course, with no policing it > > >> would not be entirely reliable, but I guess it could help in a number > > >> of different ways. The difficult part is classifying things, I would > > >> probably want a few more types > > > > >> 1. Personal - your standard user on twitter > > >> 2. Business - similar to personal, but represents a company > > >> 3. FeedBot - auto tweets from rss feed > > >> 4. Bot - auto tweets based off of some other sort of information > > >> stream > > >> 5. I'm sure there are more... > > > > >> On May 27, 10:17 am, MPS <[email protected]> wrote: > > >> > I would like to propose an additional property on twitter accounts: > > >> > account_type. > > > > >> > The main purpose for this would be to distinguish personal vs. > > >> > business accounts. > > > > >> > This would be very useful for apps that want to target one or the > > >> > other type of twitter account. > > > > >> > Who's with me on this? :-) > > > > >> > - Michael > > > > > -- > > > Abraham Williams |http://the.hackerconundrum.com > > > Hacker |http://abrah.am|http://twitter.com/abraham > > > Project |http://fireeagle.labs.poseurtech.com > > > This email is: [ ] blogable [x] ask first [ ] private. >
