Twitter has just posted a help document titled "I'm Having Problems Logging In to UberTwitter or twidroyd" that gives little hope for an immediate fix: turns out the company has outright suspended both apps -- among the most popular Twitter apps for the BlackBerry / iPhone and Android platforms, respectively -- for "violating [its] policies." They go on to say that they suspend "hundreds" of apps on a daily basis for policy violations, but decided to call out these two in particular because of the high number of users potentially affected. Considering the popularity factor, we imagine this'll be solved one way or another before too long -- but in the meantime, you might want to fall back to the official apps for all three platforms.
Twitter is now aggressively going after third-party sites and services that once helped it spread its name, message, and capabilities virally. What was once a beautiful, symbiotic relationship that appeared to raise the Twitter water level and float all Tweet-powered boats, is now a swirling mass of destruction, with Twitter at the vortex, seemingly eating its own offspring. Today, Twitter suspended UberTwitter and Twidroyd for "violating the company's API policies," and while much of the Twitter community expressed shock, I'm just waiting to see what else the whirlpool sweeps into its path.
I'm not shocked. In fact, this is pretty much what I predicted. Twitter is now doing whatever it can to shut down third-party and competing apps that tend to drag people away from Twitter's desktop and mobile clients. I had assumed that they would continue to do most of this quietly through technology (by tweaking the API). Have you noticed how poorly TweetDeck works on the iPad? The Twitter app, of course, works fine.
Turns out, though, there are other arrows in the Twitter's quiver. One of them is so obvious that I'm surprised I hadn't thought of it before. Twitter can bring out the lawyers.
According to a TechCrunch report, UberMedia's Bill Gross (UberMedia owns UberTwitter and TweetDeck), one of UberTwitter's offenses was its trademark-infringing name. Of course! This is the Apple strategy for brand-management control, and it is smart and extremely effective. In Apple's case, as soon as the iPod took off in the early part of this century, other companies started incorporating "iPod" into their names to try and drive interest to their iPod-related products. Apple quietly went around and reminded folks that while they were flattered, you can't simply use a trademarked name without permission. Go today and try to find something with the "iPod" name in it that isn't owned or explicitly sanctioned by Apple.
So Twitter is being smart, but that new laser-like focus on good business sure does sting. UberTwitter actually has to change its name to UberSocial. Not a big deal, right? Unless you consider that many of Twitter's third party apps got noticed by, well, using the Twitter name.
Unknown I knew it's can't down . http://www.ulturapro.com