Twitter suspended Feed Ze Birds application

[bearbones]

When it rains it pours.

I just got back online, and received a notice that Twitter has suspended the Feed Ze Birds application. Don't know why yet, but until further notice, I've taken the site down.

Wish I could say more, but the totality of their message was:

This is a notice that your OAuth token for Feed Ze Birds has been suspended from interacting with the Twitter API.

Please make sure that your application follows Twitter's API Terms of Service

To request for your token to be re-enabled, please write to api@twitter.com

Will post here as more information becomes available.

[edit]New information on the suspension:[/edit]

Hello,

Your application was suspended for violating our Automation Rules (http://support.twitter.com/articles/76915 ). Specifically, Tweets with sponsored content must be manually written and/or approved by the posting user and may not be scheduled in advance. Furthermore, these sponsored Tweets must be disclosed as sponsored within the Tweet and repeat posts of the same advertisement are also prohibited. Please make the necessary changes to bring your application into compliance with our Automation Rules as well as our API Terms of Service ( https://dev.twitter.com/terms/api-terms ).

It's best for both our users and your users if your application's behavior does not cause them to break our Twitter Rules ( http://support.twitter.com/articles/18311 ). Please let us know when changes have been deployed to bring it into compliance with our Terms. Thank you in advance for your cooperation.

Regards,
Twitter API Policy

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[BitPay Business Solutions]

How can we login to request a refund for the campaigns?

[ineededausername]

total BS... all the powers of the centralized internet have entered into a holy alliance to exorcise the specter of Bitcoin.

[Herodes]

Why not make a bittwitter or rather change the name to something totally unrelated.

Twitter started small at one point too. Personally I think feedze birds was a good idea.


Good luck in the future.

[Steve]

I figured they would eventually want to buy you guys out…not shut you down.

[bearbones]

No need to jump to conclusions. They're not shutting us down just yet. For all I know (still haven't heard any specifics), they just thought we pinged them too often.

In regards to refunding campaigns, I'm working on it. First thing was to lock the site down so no one tried to retweet. Letting people log in, but not retweet isn't something I'd anticipated doing.

[evoorhees]

Yeah FYI to everyone thanks for your patience... we'll figure out what Twitter's beef is and get this resolved ASAP.

Maybe they saw The Good Wife

[Bitcoin Oz]

I thought it was because I just started using it from the bitcoinmedia account and sent too much traffic lol.

[Serge]

perhaps twitter's spamming policies kicked in?

[Xenland]

Awe bummer i hope twitter can bring it back online soon i make more money on feed ze birds then i do mining on my 6990 (after electricity costs)

[ripper234]

OP - do you know that you are not violating their TOS?

[apetersson]

i must say i expected this. when discussing the app with other Bitcoin-interested people we came to the conclusion they are violating the twitter TOS and will be shut down like other likewise services once they become noticed by twitter.

[bearbones]

OP - do you know that you are not violating their TOS?

We've reviewed the Twitter TOS pretty carefully, and do not believe that our business model violates it. Obviously, they feel we violated it in some way, or they wouldn't have suspended our application. The most likely thing, however, is that it is a minor infraction which we can address.

i must say i expected this. when discussion your application with other Bitcoin-interested people we came to the conclusion they are violating the twitter TOS and will be shut down like other likewise services once they become noticed by twitter.

In what way do you think Feed Ze Birds violates the Twitter TOS?

[gregwtmtno]

That's too bad...I felt like it was just starting to take off.

[bearbones]

Finally got a response from Twitter. They clarified their reasoning, and it looks like something we can address. Will have to think carefully about it, as I believe we were already compliant. Regardless, the important thing is that Feed Ze Birds will be back soon!

Hello,

Your application was suspended for violating our Automation Rules (http://support.twitter.com/articles/76915 ). Specifically, Tweets with sponsored content must be manually written and/or approved by the posting user and may not be scheduled in advance. Furthermore, these sponsored Tweets must be disclosed as sponsored within the Tweet and repeat posts of the same advertisement are also prohibited. Please make the necessary changes to bring your application into compliance with our Automation Rules as well as our API Terms of Service ( https://dev.twitter.com/terms/api-terms ).

It's best for both our users and your users if your application's behavior does not cause them to break our Twitter Rules ( http://support.twitter.com/articles/18311 ). Please let us know when changes have been deployed to bring it into compliance with our Terms. Thank you in advance for your cooperation.

Regards,
Twitter API Policy

[ripper234]

Finally got a response from Twitter. They clarified their reasoning, and it looks like something we can address. Will have to think carefully about it, as I believe we were already compliant. Regardless, the important thing is that Feed Ze Birds will be back soon!

Hello,

Your application was suspended for violating our Automation Rules (http://support.twitter.com/articles/76915 ). Specifically, Tweets with sponsored content must be manually written and/or approved by the posting user and may not be scheduled in advance. Furthermore, these sponsored Tweets must be disclosed as sponsored within the Tweet and repeat posts of the same advertisement are also prohibited. Please make the necessary changes to bring your application into compliance with our Automation Rules as well as our API Terms of Service ( https://dev.twitter.com/terms/api-terms ).

It's best for both our users and your users if your application's behavior does not cause them to break our Twitter Rules ( http://support.twitter.com/articles/18311 ). Please let us know when changes have been deployed to bring it into compliance with our Terms. Thank you in advance for your cooperation.

Regards,
Twitter API Policy

Nice responsiveness, much better than Facebook / Apple.

Ideally this letter would have been sent simultaneously (or even before) shutting you down, but it's not too bad at this stage.

[drakahn]

Specifically, Tweets with sponsored content must be manually written and/or approved by the posting user and may not be scheduled in advance.
Furthermore, these sponsored Tweets must be disclosed as sponsored within the Tweet and repeat posts of the same advertisement are also prohibited.

i did manually approve all tweets and they were not scheduled
all the tweets disclose that they are #retweetforbitcoin right?

so, whats the problem?

[matonis]

Specifically, Tweets with sponsored content must be manually written and/or approved by the posting user and may not be scheduled in advance.
Furthermore, these sponsored Tweets must be disclosed as sponsored within the Tweet and repeat posts of the same advertisement are also prohibited.

i did manually approve all tweets and they were not scheduled
all the tweets disclose that they are #retweetforbitcoin right?

so, whats the problem?

Maybe it's because "repeat posts of the same advertisement are also prohibited." I like the idea of FeedZe Birds but I always did receive repeat posts in my timeline. That's probably the language that Twitter needs to clarify in their TOS.

[a63ntsm1th]

To be honest, in my opinion your program was just generating spam.  And it sounds like twitter is trying to stop spam.

Thank you twitter.

[genjix]

Agree with guy above.

The spam was terribly ugly looking, annoying to people interested in bitcoin news and counter-productive to the cause of bitcoin making it look like a scam because of spammy adds.

Twitter did the right thing. That spam made Twitter unusable for me, and I haven't been using it.

[PrintCoins]

Agree with guy above.

The spam was terribly ugly looking, annoying to people interested in bitcoin news and counter-productive to the cause of bitcoin making it look like a scam because of spammy adds.

Twitter did the right thing. That spam made Twitter unusable for me, and I haven't been using it.

Double-plus agreed. It was a fine idea, but I was getting people that added me and when I looked at their accounts they were just tweeting your stuff. Basically people were creating fake accounts for this.

In the end, you should have set some tough rules for number of followers, age of account, and limits on number of posts to reduce abuse. Whenever something is created to make money, the scammers don't take long to come out of the woodwork.

[Xenland]

Hmm I'd have to disagree considering if you don't like the Spam just unfollow the twitter account -- I liked the service and its up to those that are retweeting posts to decide whats relevant and whats not. I don't think feed ze birds is a blame here for spam not one bit

[FlipPro]

Hmm I'd have to disagree considering if you don't like the Spam just unfollow the twitter account -- I liked the service and its up to those that are retweeting posts to decide whats relevant and whats not. I don't think feed ze birds is a blame here for spam not one bit

I have to agree with Xenland here. The followers of the people re-tweeting the stuff always have the option to unfollow...

[bearbones]

Hmm I'd have to disagree considering if you don't like the Spam just unfollow the twitter account -- I liked the service and its up to those that are retweeting posts to decide whats relevant and whats not. I don't think feed ze birds is a blame here for spam not one bit

Thanks for your support, Xenland. This is also our understanding on the nature of Feed Ze Birds tweets.

To our critics: we are currently testing a system based Klout scores and other metrics which should help identify potential spam accounts. It is an issue that concerns us, as the value of Feed Ze Birds is made from the legitimacy of our user base. Hopefully, we can instate stricter controls soon.

We hope to have the service up and running again soon. Have requested that Twitter reinstate our application, and are waiting for a response as to what, if anything, needs to be changed to meet their TOS.

[genjix]

I don't follow accounts, I use:

https://twitter.com/#!/search/bitcoin

It's more a way of seeing the general market trends for me. Therefore important that I get a big picture look rather than a small circlejerk of friends preaching to each other

[finway]

Sorry for you.

[Xenland]

I don't follow accounts, I use:

https://twitter.com/#!/search/bitcoin

It's more a way of seeing the general market trends for me. Therefore important that I get a big picture look rather than a small circlejerk of friends preaching to each other

Yes circle jerk the world instead of friends.... Sounds a little promisicuious to me hehe

[bearbones]

Got a notice today from Twitter that all we needed to do was add "#spon" to each of our campaigns. I've done this, and they've re-enabled our application!

While Feed Ze Birds has been down, we've been addressing a couple of overdue development goals. We're going to finish these out and open up the site again by this weekend.

New features:
Better spam account recognition
Performance graphs on stats page
0 confirmation deposits

[LightRider]

Got a notice today from Twitter that all we needed to do was add "#spon" to each of our campaigns. I've done this, and they've re-enabled our application!

While Feed Ze Birds has been down, we've been addressing a couple of overdue development goals. We're going to finish these out and open up the site again by this weekend.

New features:
Better spam account recognition
Performance graphs on stats page
0 confirmation deposits

Great news!

[gregwtmtno]

Agreed. Highly excellent.

[FlipPro]

Great news ! YAY!

[FreeMoney]

Got a notice today from Twitter that all we needed to do was add "#spon" to each of our campaigns. I've done this, and they've re-enabled our application!

While Feed Ze Birds has been down, we've been addressing a couple of overdue development goals. We're going to finish these out and open up the site again by this weekend.

New features:
Better spam account recognition
Performance graphs on stats page
0 confirmation deposits

That's great!

[MemoryDealers]

I'm glad to hear you will be back online.
From what I have just read, it looks like #SPON is being forced on us by the FTC, not by twitter.
I wish the FTC would allow people to tweet whatever they please. 

[rjk]

I'm glad to hear you will be back online.
From what I have just read, it looks like #SPON is being forced on us by the FTC, not by twitter.
I wish the FTC would allow people to tweet whatever they please. 

Wait, what? Why in the fuck are they having anything to do with it?

[bearbones]

I'm glad to hear you will be back online.
From what I have just read, it looks like #SPON is being forced on us by the FTC, not by twitter.
I wish the FTC would allow people to tweet whatever they please. 

That is interesting! I was wondering why they were so strict about it...

Talk about regulating the internet. :/

[chrisrico]

From what I have just read, it looks like #SPON is being forced on us by the FTC, not by twitter.
I wish the FTC would allow people to tweet whatever they please. 

Source?

[MemoryDealers]

From what I have just read, it looks like #SPON is being forced on us by the FTC, not by twitter.
I wish the FTC would allow people to tweet whatever they please.  

Source?

Here are a few:

http://www.citmedialaw.org/legal-guide/complying-ftcs-disclosure-requirements

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/10/06/business/media/06adco.html

The F.T.C. said that beginning on Dec. 1, bloggers who review products must disclose any connection with advertisers, including, in most cases, the receipt of free products and whether or not they were paid in any way by advertisers, as occurs frequently.


http://blogs.wsj.com/digits/2011/01/10/if-you-get-paid-to-tweet-disclose-it-uk-says/

Obviously the FTC thinks they own the world.
I think I will start a new feedzebirds campaign that says something like:

The #FTC threatens people with violence if they don't include #spon in their tweets.
Abolish the #FTC

I wish they would find honest work, and let free people be free.

[evoorhees]

Back Online!

https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=62155.0

[Xenland]

Raking in money already

[chmod755]

New features:
0 confirmation deposits

What the ....? Do you really mean 0 confirmation deposits?  You shouldn't accept deposits without a few confirmations (it's not hard to send out a non-legit transaction, which never gets confirmed) unless you mean transactions from an exchange or so...

[DeathAndTaxes]

New features:
0 confirmation deposits

What the ....? Do you really mean 0 confirmation deposits?   You shouldn't accept deposits without a few confirmations (it's not hard to send out a non-legit transaction, which never gets confirmed) unless you mean transactions from an exchange or so...

"it's not hard to send out a non-legit transaction, which never gets confirmed".

A non-legit transaction wouldn't be accepted by their bitcoind thus the number of confirmations is irrelevant.  
0-confirm isn't as dangerous as people make it out to be depending on the particular situation.