If they don't allow using the API for that, use the browser directly.
> the court held that sending a cease-and-desist letter and enacting an IP address block is sufficient notice of online trespassing, which a plaintiff can use to claim a violation of the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act
If someone wants to block Google, they can simply add a robots.txt entry. An IP block would work too. (Sending a cease-and-desist letter might or might not also work, but it doesn't really matter - context and intent matters in court; Google accepting the standard robots.txt as a 'go away' signal should be more than sufficient.)
However, this would hinder the service, as with the polling model it may not always notice all the tweets.
Zing.
It is worth noting that TMZ and other sites have been storing and detecting deleted celebrity tweets for years, and still do it to this day. If you're not using the API, Twitter has no affirmative way of knowing how you obtained the information.
I wonder where that line is drawn. A person using their browser, clicking a link to load a web page initiates a hundred different automated routines[1]. Is that not automation? Is it then automation to have a click initiate another click or two more clicks? Where do you draw the line?
edit: the spirit of the rule is to grant Twitter control over when to apply the rule. Is that what you meant?
Is [F5] + [CTRL+S](for save) automated? Is a browser auto-refresh capability? is `$ watch wget` (or something to that effect) automated? getpocket.com? an IFTTT recipe? A crawler?
See what happens?
Automated means: without human intervention. So anything that accesses more than one URL without human intervention would violate the TOS.
I'm quite amazed that this would have to be spelled out. If you're going to break someone's TOS then at least be aware of it. That helps later on when you have to face the consequences. Just like I'd like to know when I'm speeding, rather than to pretend to be ignorant of the limit. That way I'd know my exposure.
Let me know when you find a non human "[F5] + [CTRL+S]". Or link me to the alien crawlers you seem to imply. Are there amazon instances of crawlers owned by non-human entities?
Do you consider the "death by bullet" to be caused by humans? By the transfer of momentum of lead? By gunpowder combustion? By human fingers pressing triggers? By time? It time killing humans? Oh no.
How long must the causal chain be for you to consider it non human?
> [F5] + [CTRL+S]
> a browser auto-refresh capability
> $ watch wget
> getpocket.com
> an IFTTT recipe
> A crawler
I can put all of these in motion. I can also write a macro that triggers them. Is there a difference? Twitter seems to want to be the arbiter of it (if it makes a difference).
That is the only spirit of the law: We reserve the right to consider your actions wrong.
Relevant part: "You may not do any of the following while accessing or using the Services: (...) crawling the Services is permissible if done in accordance with the provisions of the robots.txt file, however, scraping the Services without the prior consent of Twitter is expressly prohibited"
At least that is my layman logic. But we live in a world where ~50 page long EULAs exist, so layman logic may not be applicable in this case.
If the law truly agrees that acceptance of undisclosed terms is granted simply by virtue of access, it opens the door to rampant abuse.
Though, if you want to try the protecting yourself in a similar approach, add a header to every request in your browser that says "By responding to this request, you accept that I do NOT agree to your terms and you are willing to serve me anyway." At least in this case they would actually receive your terms with the request. I wish there was an RFC for this.
US has been very good of late about charging people that have never been to the US for violation of US laws online. It is bullshit but it seems many nations refuse to protect their citizens from harassment by the US legal system
This isn't a copyright issue at all; it's exclusively a ToS issue. Twitter can choose to prevent someone from using their API. They'd have a harder time forcing the takedown of the existing content.
As a user I think this is the right tack to take. There is no possible advantage for Twitter to have sites that make the delete feature not really work.
In particular, "fair use" specifically doesn't require people to get permission from a copyright holder:
http://fairuse.stanford.edu/overview/fair-use/what-is-fair-u...
Discussing the tweets of public figures is clearly "commentary and criticism", which would give things like PostGhost "substantial non-infringing use" (which I believe is the relevant legal threshold).
How could this possibly be relevant? Copyright won't give them any grounds to stop you from saying "he's trying to walk it back now, but he said <embarrassing statement> earlier".
Then? No, this is about getting it through the API while it's still up.
That said, Twitter administers the checkmark in puzzling and thoroughly non-transparent ways.
That is in fact the only reason Verified Accounts exist, and is the reason that non-celebrities or people otherwise lacking notoriety can not get Verified Accounts. It's not worth Twitter's effort to make my account, or any random user, Verified, it seems. But as Twitter's role continues to expand in the public sphere, it is really the public who gives out Verified Accounts (through making someone famous), and the public should have requirements, such as a certain level of consistency, from the accounts it gives the power/influence of the Verified Account to.