Does Twitter want to kill small developers who use its API?


Mathilde Rochefort

April 03, 2023 at 2:30 p.m.

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Elon Musk twitter dollars © mundissima / Shutterstock.com

© Sergei Elagin / Shutterstock

A few weeks after announcing the end of free access to its API, Twitter unveiled its new pricing system to get it. If the social network finally offers a free version, it is not certain that it will be of great use to developers…

In response to heavy criticism of its announcement, Twitter finally backtracked and announced that a free version of its API would remain available for ” bots providing good free content “.

Here are the three offers offered by Twitter

The Twitter developer team account shared the new subscription system implemented by the platform to benefit from its API. This consists of three distinct offers. The first, free, provides read-only access and 1,500 tweets per month at the application level. In other words, developers subscribing to this offer will be able to read the content, but not modify it or add new information.

The second option, named ” basic “, is offered at 100 dollars monthly. It allows to publish 3,000 tweets per month at the user level, or 50,000 tweets per month at the application level with a reading limit of 10,000 tweets. Twitter explains that the basic offering is for people who need higher access than the free version, but not as extensive a use as its latest offering.

This one, intended for companies, offers a “ commercial-grade access that meets your specific needs and those of your customers », as well as services managed by a dedicated team. For now, Twitter has not communicated the amount, but it could reach several thousand dollars.

musk twitter money © Mario Breda / Shutterstock.com / Clubic.com

Mario Breda / Shutterstock.com / Clubic.com

Appalled developers

If this approach is part of a desire to diversify Twitter’s income by Elon Musk, it has not been received positively by the developers.

Many have expressed concern about the impact of the new restrictions on their projects. Some are forced to end it completely, while others must increase their prices to continue to be able to access the API.

Its old system will be rendered obsolete in the ” next 30 days “. Twitter therefore encourages developers to subscribe to one of its new offers as soon as possible. It is not certain that this pricing alleviates the tensions that already exist between the social network and its community of developers…

Source : The Verge



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