The scariest part about all of this, frankly, is less the trademark
stuff, and more the fact that he is being punished for violating
Twitter's terms and services. As near as I can tell, his app just
follows users who tweet certain keywords. It doesn't even UNFOLLOW
them (thus potentially churning), it just follows people.
Since there are API calls for those actions, many of us have built
rich apps around follow. Indeed, Twitter DOES support mass
following... if not, why would batch following be in their roadmap
(http://apiwiki.twitter.com/V2-Roadmap#Following )... To now see
another app taken down because of supposed API violations around mass
following is very scary.
And what's even MORE scary is the selectivity of it. Why was this
little guy taken down? What about, say, the popular downloadable XYZ
app which apparently does what tweetbutler does and then some? Do
they have some more formal relationship with Twitter? Or do their
other apps somehow inculcate them against violating TS?
It's a minefield out there, and that's VERY VERY scary. Who knows if
the API calls you make today might violate terms and services
tomorrow? Perhaps you can count your lucky stars if you have casual
email correspondence with a Twitter engineer... maybe that's what's
needed to fend off trouble? And too bad for those guys over in
England, like this guy, who perhaps didn't have such a relationship!
