+1, Ed. Nice post. The humans will win! Whether every RSS feed, weather station, search query, refrigerator, etc is allowed to be turned into a twitter bot is a policy decision for Twitter. I like to think that Twitter would prefer to be an original source of unique and meaningful content and not just a dump for low grade data.
> First of all, there is only one form of spam - it's *unsolicited* messages > sent massively. When I am followed by a bot, or even a human who has no actual interest in my tweets but is only trying for a follow back, I regard it as an unsolicited message. This happens way too much and as a victim, I don't care if it's been done "massively". Spam is spam and fake following - on whatever scale - not only uses resources but complicates analysis of the social network. Twitter has allowed the follow mechanism to be repurposed as a simple attention grabbing measure, but they tell us that the rules will evolve. It is also within their power to keep the bot armies at bay. Date: Wed, 27 Jan 2010 09:37:43 -0800 Subject: Re: [twitter-dev] Re: Mass account creation From: zzn...@gmail.com To: twitter-development-talk@googlegroups.com On Wed, Jan 27, 2010 at 9:02 AM, DenisioDelBoro <alya...@gmail.com> wrote: First of all, there is only one form of spam - it's *unsolicited* messages sent massively. Second of all, tell me, please, in what way creating, let's say, 100 accounts just for tweeting weather forecasts for different cities is a spam? I'm not talking about mentioning there random nicknames or something like that to get new followers, of course. Just pure forecast, without any links. Third of all, why do you think those RSS feeds will be useless? Maybe it's more convenient for some users to get updates with Twitter than with Google Reader. I don't see how "creating, let's say, 100 accounts just for tweeting weather forecasts for different cities" fits in with the Twitter "spirit", which is humans talking to other humans over the messaging system. For example, here in Portland, we have a hashtag, "#pdxtst" (PDX Twitter Storm Team) where we talk about the sometimes unusual weather in this normally boring rainy place. It's people talking about the weather. We had an unexpected snowstorm a few weeks back, and Mayor Sam Adams got on Twitter and gave traffic and Tri-Met updates. I doubt very seriously if the folks in the #pdxtst chat would have appreciated some bot spewing the National Weather Service warnings or the stuff coming from the TV weather crews. Those crews were, in fact, on Twitter conversing with people! Fortunately, this all happened before the "texting while driving" ban went into effect. Maybe what you propose is simply annoying and not spam, but don't be too terribly surprised if you build it and see people blocking you, rather than simply not following. I unfollow bots often and block when something gets "annoying enough". But Twitter isn't intended to be an aggregator! On 27 янв, 18:30, Dale Folla MeDia <mogul...@gmail.com> wrote: > the only possible reasons someone would have to create that many accounts > would be to spam in one form or another. There should be other ways to skin > that cat.. You could not keep up with that many accounts unless you sent > out huge amounts of useless RSS feeeds just to gain followers so you can > mass dm them... > > > On Thu, Jan 7, 2010 at 5:16 AM, Andrew Badera <and...@badera.us> wrote: > > I would point them to examples of other apps (local news spammers come > > to mind) that have recently been blacklisted. > > > That aside, I for one am 100% opposed to giving anyone this sort of > > tool. Not that certain other people on this list haven't already done > > so for profit, sadly. > > > ∞ Andy Badera > > ∞ +1 518-641-1280 Google Voice > > ∞ This email is: [ ] bloggable [x] ask first [ ] private > > ∞ Google me:http://www.google.com/search?q=andrew%20badera > > > On Thu, Jan 7, 2010 at 7:50 AM, Jonathan Markwell > > <j.l.markw...@inuda.com> wrote: > > > Hi All, > > > > Would be interested to hear both the community's opinion on this and > > > the official Twitter view. > > > > I have a client that wants to create thousands of new accounts that > > > they can use to send out a wide variety of niche interest tweets. They > > > already have a quote from an outsourcing company that can do the work > > > and are keen to go ahead. The accounts will, for the most part, be > > > automated but I'm encouraging them to ensure each gets at least some > > > human participation in them on a regular basis. > > > > I'm apprehensive about this and I'm trying to disuade them from going > > > ahead. I'm not convinced that accounts that are primarily automated, > > > especially when set up on this scale can add that much value to the > > > ecosystem. Their feeling is quite the opposite and they believe the > > > audience they are working to provide for will find this extremely > > > valuable. In addition they are confident, and have some data to back > > > it up, that what they are creating will bring a huge number of new > > > real users to Twitter. > > > > What are your thoughts on this? > > > > Jon. > > > > -- > > > Jonathan Markwell > > > Engineer | Founder | Connector > > > > Inuda Innovations Ltd, Brighton, UK > > > > Web application development & support > > > Twitter & Facebook integration specialists > > >http://inuda.com > > > > Organising the world's first events for the Twitter developer Community > > >http://TwitterDeveloperNest.com<http://twitterdevelopernest.com/> > > > > Providing a nice little place to work in the middle of Brighton - > > >http://theskiff.org > > > > Measuring your brand's visibility on the social web - > >http://HowSociable.com<http://howsociable.com/> > > > > mob: 07766 021 485 | tel: 01273 704 549 | fax: 01273 376 953 > > > skype: jlmarkwell | twitter:http://twitter.com/jot > > -- > Dale Merritt > Fol.la MeDia, LLC -- M. Edward (Ed) Borasky http://borasky-research.net "I've always regarded nature as the clothing of God." ~Alan Hovhaness _________________________________________________________________ Hotmail: Powerful Free email with security by Microsoft. https://signup.live.com/signup.aspx?id=60969
