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Comment by ajg1977 | Hacker News Reader

ajg1977

"We haven't changed our policies, we're just enforcing them differently" - the 2011 catchphrase for platform providers

According to Twitter, the measure was taken after months of warnings:

"[Twitter] had conversations with UberMedia, the developer of these applications, about policy violations since April 2010"

"[S]everal applications, including UberTwitter, twidroyd and UberCurrent, [...] have violated Twitter policies and trademarks in a variety of ways. These violations include, but aren’t limited to, a privacy issue with private Direct Messages longer than 140 characters, trademark infringement, and changing the content of users’ Tweets in order to make money."

UberMedia CEO Bill Gross says these are new issues Twitter never brought up before:

“We just talked to Twitter and discussed the various issues they raise. It took us by surprise because they didn’t raise them before."

http://techcrunch.com/2011/02/18/ubermedia-bill-gross-twitte...

At the very least, UberMedia knew that Twitter frowns upon the use of the terms 'twitter' and 'tweet' in the name of a 3rd party app, as those are trademarks owned by Twitter.

But of course UberMedia had to act surprised, what other explanation could they have offered their users? Like with anyone caught cheating, the predictable response is "Really, this isn't what it looks like!".

"Twitter" sure, but if they discourage tweet, it's a new thing. You used to be encouraged to use tweet in your app name instead of twitter. Remember, they didn't officially call them "tweets" until recently(ish). You can even register twitter names with "tweet" in them, not "twitter."

From Twitter's Help Center [1]:

  You may:
  * Name your website, product, or application with something unique. Uses of Tw-, and Twit- are generally okay with us.
  * Feel free to include language on your site explaining that your application is built on the Twitter platform so people understand your product.
  * Use Tweet in the name of your application only if it is designed to be used exclusively with the Twitter platform.
  
  You may not:
  * Use Twitter in the name of your website or application.
  * Use just "Tweet" or "Tweet" with a simple letter or number combination (for example, 1Tweet, Tweet, Tweets).
  * Register a domain containing twitter (or misspellings of twitter).
  * Apply for a trademark with a name including Twitter or Tweet (or similar variations thereof).
  * Use Tweet in the name of your application if used with any other platform.

So the use of 'tweet' in an app name is allowed, if the app is a pure twitter client (not an app that integrates multiple social networks). You also have to agree not to trademark the name, if that name contains the word 'tweet'.

[1] http://support.twitter.com/articles/77641

As far as I know Twitter only discourages the use of Tweet in application names if you integrate with no applications other then Twitter like Facebook, Buzz, Foursqure, etc.

2010 was the year to invest in platforms. 2011 is the year to invest elsewhere. So long Facebook, Twitter, Apple - I no longer trust your platforms enough to put any significant resources into development.

It's time to end the walled garden resurgence and the best way to do that is on the ground floor.

More like 2011 is a year of over-generalizations. Good luck trying to find anything you can trust anyway.

I didn't mean it to be a broad generalization. Each platform has it's own problems, this is just the latest in another reminder that each of these can shut your business down with the flick of a switch or if they catch wind of competition they don't feel is right for their particular walled garden.

I trust myself to deliver products my customers want and find useful. That's enough for me.

With all these platforms (iphone/facebook/twitter),I think the smartest guys are those who do not get much news coverage, make decent money silently without growing too big, and not being too small. When you exist because of benevolent dictator,don't think of pointing a 0.44 magnum and getting lucky if you are just going to get nuked!!!

"I think the smartest guys are those who do not get much news coverage, make decent money silently without growing too big, and not being too small"

no spread news about the site, lots of money, small userbase --- is this even possible??? if yes, please give an example of a working site.

I don't know about the year-by-year breakdown, but that's exactly how I feel currently.

The platforms I've built for are each in the process of betraying their developers. I've done well with them so far but it's absolutely time to build independent businesses.

Independent of what? Platforms, technology, customers? Don't kid yourself, there's always somebody who's your "boss".

Independent of a platform which can shut you down just because you are a competitor.

It's amazing that people seem surprised that such a path is even an option.

I suppose you could argue that Level3, the big DNS servers, or InterNIC, or even DHS can shut you down too, but that seems awfully different then Twitter shutting down twitter app competitors, Apple threatening to pull content (competing) apps if they don't get their 30%, and Facebook potentially forcing apps to use their credit system or go home.

I'm really hoping people realize that this walled garden approach is hurting them in the end, and as these platforms move the goal posts more and more for what is acceptable, you might find you have wasted a few years of your life chasing a ghost.

It's up to you which path you choose, but for me, today, I'm making the decision to abandon these platforms and go my own way.

If you have a business based on say, using Twitter's API, you are wholly dependent upon them.

They could cut off your access, destroying you overnight. They could become less popular themselves, decreasing the value of your business in a way you have no control over.

That's not at all like being dependent upon a host, a linux distribution, your customers, or yourself. In a business based on some corporations external API you have all the usual dependencies plus your source, a single point of failure who is in a position of power over you.

I'm not sure this generalization applies to the same degrees to Apple, Facebook and Twitter.

Twitter especially has a hard platform to monetize to begin with - tweets are about all it has and so can't let someone hijack them even a little bit.

Twitter seems like the best "citizen of the open Internet" here. Distantly followed by Facebook, then with Apple being a foe openness as far as I can see.

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