I first saw the news on Twitter, with a link from @blogherald to their post Twitter Kills “Pay Per Tweet” Companies (The Twitterverse Rejoices).
It looks like Twitter has finally made up its mind regarding third party tweet ad services (like Be-A-Magpie, BeTweeted and the infamous Sponsored Tweets via IZEA) and the verdict is “no ads for you!”
Then I head over to Sponsored Tweets and check out what they’ve got to say: Changes Coming to Sponsored Tweets
We are going to make some changes to the way Sponsored Tweets works. We will no longer be publishing directly to your account through the Twitter API. Instead you will have to write the tweet yourself in whatever Twitter client you see fit.
Yes, it will be a more manual process. Yes, we liked the old way better too. But we want to comply with Twitters guidelines and be a good ecosystem partner. We have always made adjustments to our system to remain in compliance. Twitter has allotted 30 days to make this change, we will try to get it out as soon as we can. Until then it is business as usual.
Seems some people are thrilled, and some are absolutely irate. Basically, Twitter seems to not be telling us what we can and can’t post, but rather HOW we post it.
… we will not allow any third party to inject paid tweets into a timeline on any service that leverages the Twitter API. We are updating our Terms of Service to articulate clearly what we mean by this statement, and we encourage you to read the updated API Terms of Service to be released shortly. (Twitter Blog)
So it’s not that you can’t, it’s just that by doing things this way, it makes it more annoying for you and they’re hoping you give up entirely.
They claim it’s for the “long term health of the Twitter ecosystem”. Some feel that it’s simply because they don’t want anyone making money until they do.
What are your thoughts?
@FantasyClay
I think it’s a good thing. Twitter wasn’t meant to be a way to make money. The automated ads are really annoying, if the best you can do to make money is annoy followers with auto ads, you really need to rethink stuff
@srpatterson
I was just getting close to getting paid out on some accounts with SponsoredTweets. Seems like Twitter is really starting to clamp down on all API uses that are questionable. I used to use a service that allowed me to follow 50 accounts at a time and drop 50 accounts at a time. It was a quick way to grow your followers. Now this has been outlawed too.
@mikestenger
I think part of it has to do with cleaning up some of the spam and the other part has to do with Twitter not wanting any competition with their new Promoted Tweets program. If they were to continue to allow sites such as Sponsored Tweets inject ads into Twitter streams, that could easily take away advertisers.
In the end though, they found a way to get around it. Will be interesting to see how Twitter takes it.
@JohnAguiar
Sponsored tweets are still available thru ad.ly and sponsored tweets, just not thru Twitter API so things will change but you will still see out side ads.
Sponsored tweets are still available thru ad.ly and sponsored tweets, just not thru Twitter API so things will change but you will still see out side ads.
@FreeWebApps
I wonder if this applies to Kim Kardashian?
@HeyLiane
In short, Twitter says, “can you at least log in to our site and write your tweet”? Nothing really changed much, their’s still sponsored tweets, just a bit of a slight change in process
@shirleyszone
Hmm….seems Sponsored Tweets is making a whole lot of changes lately. Interesting
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@ovejita
I think it’s great. Whatever twitter does to make the twittosphere a little bit less impersonal is a good thing. I use twitter to connect to real people, not to see anoying automated crap in my timeline.
Aaaaand.. about the @srpatterson comment… 50 accounts at a time??? Maybe I’m too demanding, but it’s nice when someone gives me at least 10 seconds of attention and an exclusive click before following me…
@madhatter7zero
Am I the only one who thinks twitter should have had some form of ad service like sponsored tweets that we could opt into from the get go? It seems to me like Twitter is just jealous because another service started something they didn’t have the mind to do when they started twitter… and now all of a sudden these changes in API usage because they don’t want third party advertising services using their automated resources. Sorry but I have to call a #FAIL on @twitter for that one. The reason I’m saying is because if they had done things right when they started twitter then they could have raised the money they needed to support their tremendous user base and be able to keep up with the millions of tweets that go out each day and we would see less freakin’ fail whale.
I happen to be a sponsored tweets user but I only approve ad’s that I think may be beneficial to my followers and I only approve (mostly) the ad’s from advertisers who are willing to pay my premium price for tweeting which is currently at $.64 cents per tweet. I rarely approve any of the CPC ad’s because they seem a little “spammy” to me so I don’t feel like I am harrassing my followers with intrusive ad tweets. I think if more sponsored tweets users did that then their wouldn’t be so many complaints about ad tweets….. anyway…..
So what happens if Twitter decides all-together to ban third party ad services and stops us from having the opportunity to make money from them? I’ll be pissed yes, but wouldn’t mind if I have to actually write the ad in my own client. $.64 isn’t a lot per tweet but over time it could add up substantially and I’m looking for that as a possible opportunity to pay for a year of site hosting for my website next year… all for doing nothing more than sending out an occasional tweet.
Yes, I know twitter needs a way to start making money for itself and that is cause for so many changes but like I said they should have rolled that out from the get go.
Another thought: Why doesn’t twitter start a subscription service for it’s users? I think twitter has proven valuable enough that a lot of people would pay (a not expensive amount) to use the service. Not only would this make it so that first off, they wouldn’t even need their own “paid tweets” program…. but think about it…. the paid subscription usage would cut out a lot of spammers don’t you think? I think it would.
@jobucks2010
yes, of course they should want to make billion first before others….