Unsurprisingly, Elon Musk took a turn for the controversial changes to Twitter.
Last week’s decision to stop free access to Twitter’s API didn’t seem to go according to plan. In response to the avalanche of criticism, Musk announced on Saturday (via a tweet, of course) that bots that create “good content” will now be able to utilize a “lightweight, write-only” version of his API.
Twitter gets rid of the free API layer. This is a nightmare for accessibility activists.
Tweet may have been deleted
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For those who missed the discussion on this, Twitter has been offering free versions of its site tools to anyone who needs them for years. The idea was theoretically to curb the bot problem on the site, but the counterargument is that what it does is @possum every hour(opens in new window), just post a picture of the possum every hour. This kind of friendly, harmless bot account is a big part of why Twitter remains fun.
Musk predictably skimped on the details, but it seems likely that these accounts will continue to operate, at least for now. How limited is the “write-only” version of the API? What is “good content” according to Musk? Is it just animal content, or is accessibility activity also important? is still unknown, and given that everything about Twitter is in flux these days, the rules are subject to change. again Immediately without warning.
Still, it looks like Possum accounts can somehow survive, at least for the time being.
