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Is network effect so strong that Twitter can go so long at to try to destroy its own platform? Or is it the lack of an alternative? Makes me think of Oracle doing the same with Java by trying to extend copyright to APIs.

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Is Twitter even a platform any more? They are going out of their way to limit and prevent 3rd party app's so they can distil down what Twitter is.. a status update service.

Beyond using Twitter for authentication I don't see why you would want to risk anything else on the Twitter API.

They don't share the user's email address. Kinda rules out using them for authentication, IMO.

Why? It protects the user's privacy, unlike Facebook. Ask them for their email address after they authenticate and make it an act of volition.

So far it seems yes. There's a reasonably established alternative at identi.ca, but so far it mainly has users who're there for "ideological" reasons, so it's a good place to follow e.g. Debian developers, but hasn't succeeded in attracting the broad range of people who use Twitter.

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