Twitter has launched a new limited experiment to promote third-party security tools in its service, TechCrunch reports. The test will initially focus on applications such as Block Party, Bodyguard and Moderate, which can help block harassment and other toxic content on the platform.
With this experiment, selected users will see these services promoted with a new prompt when they mute or block another Twitter account. He highlights the apps included in the Twitter Toolbox, a recently launched initiative that is currently promoting third-party Twitter tools in an online hub. “Twitter’s toolbox offers more solutions to enhance your Twitter experience,” the prompt said before listing a selection of services.
The experiment is an attempt by Twitter to promote third-party tools on its platform that currently need to rely on word of mouth or traditional advertising to attract new users. “[Developers] we want users and we want to provide them with the right users at the right time, ”Twitter product manager Amir Shevat told TechCrunch.
Example of a third-party tool prompt shown to users in the test. Image: Twitter via TechCrunch
This comes as Twitter tries to reconsider its historically broken relationship with third-party developers. In the early days of Twitter, the social media network had a very open approach, allowing developers to create fully functional third-party clients for its service. But by 2012, that approach was changing, and by 2018, Twitter had virtually killed the market for full-featured third-party customers.
But just two years later, the company is restoring tools available to third-party developers. It released version 2 of its API in early access in 2020, with support for “chat threads, poll results in tweets, fixed tweets in profiles, spam filtering, and a more powerful language for filtering streams and search queries. “. The new API left early access last year, although it still places some restrictions on developers, such as limiting them to download 500,000 or 2 million tweets per month, depending on their level of access.
According to Shevat, the hope is to promote a mutually beneficial relationship between Twitter and third-party developers. “Right now I’m thinking of Twitter as Nokia’s old phone” was a good phone. But the only app in it was Snake, if you remember, “Shevat told TechCrunch. “I see the future of Twitter as an iPhone, where the value you get is actually through developer innovation.
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