The social network Twitter, since it was bought by Elon Musk, is changing by leaps and bounds, without warning, and confusing users who want to stay on the web. There are many users who use third-party clients because they include functionalities and designs, which overnight have been seen without being able to use them because Twitter has changed the terms of use and now directly, they are all prohibited.
This is a very notorious fact, because Twitter it's one of those networks that grew because people used those unofficial clients taking advantage of the fact that the API was very simple. With this, usability was generated with PC, iOS and Android applications that allowed a more personal experience, and some of them were bought by Twitter itself, such as Tweetdeck or Tweetie for iOS, or even introduced new features that would later be copied. But everything indicates that, being Elon Musk in charge, that was not going to happen anymore.
Now only the official Twitter applications are valid
The change came two days after a vague tweet saying they were going to “exercise application of API rules", without pointing to any. Using a text comparison tool of the Twitter developer agreement between the effective dates of October 10, 2022 and January 19, 2023, a single change is shown that states "Restrictions on use of licensed materials. The addition restricts the ability of developers to: … c) use or access the Licensed Materials to create or attempt to create a substitute or similar product or service for the Twitter Applications«.
In a post announcing the end of Twitterific, developer Sean Heber wrote that “the app's sudden and undignified demise is due to an increasingly capricious Twitter, a Twitter we no longer recognize as trustworthy or want to continue working with«. He asked Twitterific subscribers not to request refunds as thousands of refund requests would take a toll on his business.
There are two big reasons why this happens. First, Elon Musk would want to control all access to Twitter, so his idea that Twitter Blue payers and official companies would be more visible and ads seen, preventing a third-party client from removing this experience. The second is that would have fired the entire team that was in charge of developing the API.
Source: ArsTechnica
