Response Time During Holidays

[HeroicSocialApp]

I understand many of the Twitter dev team has been taking vacation during the Christmas and New Year’s holidays and saw the post that confirmed this.

However, our application was unfortunately restricted from write access during this time; it’s been 3 days and we’ve gotten no response on our ticket.

I’m only wondering… how long can I expect before receiving a reply? We are hemorrhaging users, paid members are canceling, and it’s gravely affecting us as a small business.

I understand that you guys process requests in a queue and that you can’t comment on specific apps here, but our app ID is 12843907 and I would really appreciate if our ticket could get some attention sooner rather than later.

Thanks.

[DanielCHood]

I know it’s hard because of paying customers but you need to be patient and likely wait a couple more days. I was in the same spot a few months ago. Good communication with your member base and pro rated refunds may help hold them over.

[HeroicSocialApp]

Yes, we’re trying to be patient. It’s frustrating that they allow this to happen right before a holiday week though. Instead of having automated systems that send email warnings to apps that might be in violation of rules (written or unwritten), they instead err on the side of disregard for the small businesses that rely on their API to keep their doors open. Is it too much to ask to have a warning email shot off before just suddenly having your application restricted?

Not to mention the fact that there’s no specific reason even provided. If the automated algorithm does not provide a specific reason for restricting an app, it’s time to update that algorithm so at least more information can be provided to the developers.

[andypiper]

I very much understand your concern, impatience and frustration.

Given the questions you’ve asked on other threads, and indeed the name of your app, I’m going to guess that this is an automation restriction driven by our antispam and anti-automation bots. Our policies are extremely clear on bulk and/or automated follow/unfollow. I realise that you’re now likely to challenge with a number of other app names, which I am unable to comment on for privacy reasons, but these policies have not changed for a long time and in my opinion should act as a good indicator of the kinds of functionality that Twitter does not endorse or find useful.

The good news is that the team(s) are coming back online this week and hopefully if you’ve followed instructions in any of the automated messages you’ve received, your case should be reviewed shortly. I cannot put a timeframe or any guarantee of success on that review, but please bear with our small team as we work down our backlog. Thanks for working with us.

[HeroicSocialApp]

Thanks again Andy and I do appreciate that. I’m not going to bring up other applications because I know that’s not going to get me anywhere. But can I formally request a change to the automated systems to fire off a warning email with some information about why it could be flagged before taking drastic measures? We have read the rules very carefully before implementing any new feature and there is absolutely no bulk or automated follow/unfollow going on.

However, it is my understanding (now) that the anti-spam bots have some criteria that aren’t published anywhere in the rules, such as flagging apps that post too many tweets with the same URL (which ours does with a tag for marketing purposes), hashtag, or mention. I only know this because I’ve seen places on this forum where you’ve talked about it. This behavior is allowed according to the rules but the fact that this can lead to restrictions is not officially documented anywhere that I’ve seen.

I do understand Twitter’s team is smaller than it used to be, but it’s not as small as ours! And getting restricted right before a holiday weekend is, well, kind of sucky (for lack of a better word).