Twitter says it is working with the developers of Proxlet, a third-party client that was shut down last week for violating its developer rules.
Proxlet helps users manage their Twitter feeds by blocking apps, organizing hash tags and muting users. Last week Twitter told developers Aaron White and Chris Ricca, who could not be reached for comment, that the client was being disable for exposing proxy URLs, which could have to the leaking of personal information.
Update: The “only thing that has changed so far on our end is disabling the extension so it isn’t hurting users, and deciding how we’ll notify our native client users,” White said in an email Tuesday. “Unfortunately, since Chris & I built Proxlet as a side project and are pursuing other startups, it’s really hard to be in ‘reactionary’ mode & do support justice.”
White complained in an interview to BostonInno that they had been given no warning or time to repair the glitch before the site was shut down, and that many of their tens of thousands of users had no way of knowing that the client had been disabled. But Twitter spokesperson Jodi Olson said the company followed standard procedure in shutting down Proxlet.
“We enforce these rules to protect our users and to keep the ecosystem fair for everyone,” Olson said. “After developers come into compliance with our terms, we reactivate them.”
Olson said in an email Monday that Twitter was working with White and Ricca to restore Proxlet’s service, but didn’t give a timeline of when the service may be up and running again.
Twitter began cracking down on developers that violated its rules a year ago, forcing tweet-archiving service TwapperKeeper to turn off many of its key features and butting heads with third-party developer UberMedia.
