Ask HN: How Will Twitter’s New API Restrictions Affect the Platform?

3 pointssmooke1 comment

Following an abrupt announcement on the Twitter dev account - that it will no longer support free access to the Twitter API from February 9, 2023, Musk said, instead, that the platform will provide a free write-only API for “bots providing good content that is free”. In light of yet another ‘shakeup’ of the mammoth app, what does its near future look like?

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I think everyone outside of Twitter is pretty much still in the dark on how this will turn out. It seems to be evolving as we approach 2/9, which is similar to how other policies have come about. To me, it looks like the strategy is to make newsworthy announcements that receive a lot of attention, a large part of that being feedback that they use to tweak the policy. From what I can tell, their goals are a combination of attempting to make the company more profitable and solve the bad bot problem. e.g. When someone must submit their credit card and identity, it's harder and more expensive to create too many API project accounts that circumvent moderation. It seems like the 2/9 date is unrealistic because the developer site still doesn't offer the upgrade and a lot of companies won't be able to react to the change that quick.

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