
$10000 BTC Bounty for an open source tool to export your Twitter followers - tosh
https://github.com/balajis/twitter-export
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daenz
>Ideally you release three versions: open source script, local app, and hosted
web app. ... I reserve the right to not award if nothing meets the criteria by
then.

>If you have a solution that works in theory, but that breaks on accounts with
many followers, or gets an account banned or shadowbanned for spam, or has
some other serious negative side effect, then you don't have a solution.

Not worth it, imo. Release 3 versions of an app, and make sure it works on
accounts with hundreds of thousands of followers+, without hitting some hidden
Twitter tripwires, and maybe you'll have a chance at $10k?

~~~
WrtCdEvrydy
Original tweet also says $1000, so I don't know where the extra zero came
from.

~~~
tethys
See [https://github.com/balajis/twitter-export#bounty-
commits](https://github.com/balajis/twitter-export#bounty-commits)

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EE84M3i
The title is misleading. By "export" they don't mean using the API to export
the followers (trivial), they also mean sending them DMs and some other stuff
for getting them to move to a different platform.

~~~
cryptoz
Yeah, this isn't 'export', this is new spam.

There is also no evidence presented that sending mass spam DMs to people with
links is going to have a more positive impact on your followers coming to your
new platform. It seems a lot more likely that word-of-mouth would spread where
you are if you are really an influencer, and what is wrong with a few public
tweets?

This is a half-baked idea that is arrogant and rude, IMO. At least present
some analysis that publicly tweeting is _worse_ than mass DMs with links.

Let me tell you this, if I get a generic DM with a link I am __NOT __ever
going to click that. Haven 't Twitter people become used to getting spam links
mass DMd to them? I think nobody would click.

~~~
np_tedious
Might be dumb, but assuming they will genuinely pay is it really arrogant or
rude? People will work on it if and only if the bounty is worth it to them.

~~~
cryptoz
I think it's arrogant to assume that your followers on Twitter love you so
much that they will follow you anywhere, sign up on a new platform, click on
sketchy mass DM links to a 100% rate. The whole tone of the post is arrogant
IMO.

It's not 'export' unless every single one of your followers does exactly what
your DM says. It's rude to mass DM any audience that isn't expecting it. I
think the title is wrong, the concept is rude, and the post language itself is
arrogant.

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ivanstojic
I may be reading the Twitter terms incorrectly, but it seems like any solution
will be against it.

TOS states:

> You may not send unsolicited Direct Messages in a bulk or automated manner,
> and should be thoughtful about the frequency with which you contact users
> via Direct Message.

This is exactly what the proposed solution would have to do.

~~~
drawfloat
Yeah, this feels almost like a get out clause that will prevent ever having to
pay out on the bounty – though I don't think it's intentional.

If this is meant for people with large follower counts and _regardless of
approach_ you ultimately end up sending thousands upon thousands of messages
with the same content + a link, you're going to get flagged and you're going
to get banned.

I feel like the authors of bounty are focusing too much on their
understandable and not intentionally malicious use case, and overlooking the
fact they're asking for a straight up run of the mill spam bot.

In fact the only difference to your usual spam bot is the ultimate aim of the
spam it's sending is to actively harm Twitter's own business.

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Icathian
This seems like it should be trivially easy, even for someone like me with
relatively weak web chops. Am I missing some subtle obstacle with Twitter that
makes it complicated? Or is this going to just get 500+ entries that they have
to sift through and functionally pick one at random?

~~~
paulcole
Reading the linked article will clear up your confusion. The bounty isn’t just
for the export, it’s for the ability to send a mass DM to all followers.

~~~
Icathian
No, I read the article. Is a for-loop to send each scraped account a DM with
pre-written text contents particularly hard in Twitter? I know they've locked
down their API a bit, do they also do something to fight with Selenium or
whatever headless-browser of choice someone would want to use?

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drumttocs8
Who on HN wants to build this spam tool for them?

~~~
Nextgrid
Plenty of people on HN make big money through advertising or "content
marketing". Those are just different words for spam.

I don't think HN will do it because they're offering a low price (this tool
will be brittle and will need constant support & changes as Twitter updates
their API or anti-spam procedures), but ethics will not be a problem for a
significant chunk of people.

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rvz
> This is also a miniature experiment in decentralised work

GitCoin is also a thing with decentralised cryptocurrency bounty work like
this: [https://gitcoin.co](https://gitcoin.co)

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billsmithaustin
How about a tool that spams a Twitter user on behalf of every follower?

