Twitter updates now mine Aug06 '08

After I angrily wrote about Twitter's lack of accessible archives for users, I decided to be proactive about it and create my own way of archiving my tweets.

Rather than updating Twitter directly, I will update via a custom app which copies each update into a local database, as well as updating on Twitter. To my followers, nothing changes. My updates still come across in real-time as they are sent.

There are two ways I typically update Twitter:

My custom app has a browser interface, as well as an SMS interface. So I don't sacrifice much by using my own app. However, I can no longer update via twitter.com, the Twitter SMS number, third-party utilities, etc. This is something I'm willing to accept. There is no other way, as I currently see it.

Twitter has essentially locked out all access to my entire archive of updates. My updates, mind you. Sure, they provide me the most recent 200, but out of 8,000 (and climbing), 200 is pathetic. It's really just the principle behind it. Users' data should be their data. Telling me your system can't handle users retrieving large amounts of updates is not my problem.

Take, for example, Flickr. Would it be acceptable for them to disallow access to any photos or videos older than a month? Should they provide you a message:

Sorry. Your archives only go back one month.

Absolutely not acceptable.

I understand Twitter may some day fix this limitation, but I'm not going to continue to sit around and wait for that day to come, while constantly giving them more updates, which eventually disappear into the void.

So, the deal is this. All future updates are now mine. However, the previous 8,000 are still on Twitter's servers. I haven't figured out how I'm going to get all those off, but at least I'm moving in the right direction.

Categories: Development , SMS , Twitter

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There is always tweetdumpr, but it does leave out the twitter_id column, which might be useful for ... Read more.

matthom is published and produced by Matt Thommes - an independent publishing enthusiast, mobile blogger, content creator, informative writer, web developer from Chicago. Never one to conform, Matt intends to promote the effect the web has on our lives, in an effort to intensify, instruct, and clarify all that is happening around us.

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