
Twitter Cuts Off JustSpotted's (formerly Scoopler) Firehose Access - ssclafani
http://techcrunch.com/2010/10/14/twitter-justspotted/
======
danilocampos
So it's Gawker Stalker, worldwide?

I mean...

Well.

These are real people, with dreams and ambitions and parents somewhere. They
want to make the most of their startup and their tech with this pivot. I wish
them well because what they're doing is hard and I admire it.

They are bigger people than I. I don't know how I could be excited to get up
in the morning and advance the state of the art of something as insipid as
realtime celebrity tracking. _Anything_ around celebrity is almost always
bereft of decency or lasting value. Celebrity masturbation's inconsequential
place in the grand effort to move humanity forward, relative to the amount of
time, energy and money it receives, fills me with sadness and exhaustion. I
try not to think about it. I try to forget it exists. This story has pierced
that shroud a bit.

May I be declared an idiot when People Magazine buys them in two years and
they're set for their next venture. I just... could not do it.

------
ajmalasver
We actually weren't using the firehose from Twitter for JustSpotted. That
relationship was for Scoopler, our real-time search engine which we shut down
on Tuesday. We're using the public APIs for this new site. Basically,
everything still rocking.

~~~
todayiamme
>>>everything still rocking<<<

 _Sigh_.

I wonder what happened to changing the world?

~~~
todayiamme
Is it wrong to wonder why they're throwing something as meaningful as live
data integration at this massive scale on tracking human beings as if they
were animals? Sure, the startup was about to sink and they wanted to make the
most of their money, but surely there could have been better uses for that
technology than violating someone's privacy?

Can you imagine what it must feel like to be some xyz celebrity right now?
Just how unsafe something like this is for them? What right does anyone have
to tread on someones life like that?

------
maukdaddy
My head is going to explode from the number of times "pivot" is mentioned in
that article.

------
kno
Golden rule for startup: do not build your entire model on the back of a giant
like Twitter. Outcome: They will buy you off (rarely), they will cut your
oxygen line off or they replicate your service; in most cases your screwed.

~~~
mikeryan
I think this is a risk, but Facebook and Twitter both have very large
ecosystems of startups having success on those platforms. (See: Zynga and
Twitpic)

The lesson here is more of proper strategic planning. Just because you have
access to a firehose doesn't mean you should just start waving it around.

------
AlexMuir
Next up: Google Maps withdrawn.

~~~
AlexMuir
lol

From Google Maps TOS
(<http://www.google.com/intl/en_ALL/help/terms_maps.html>)

[...]

you will not: (a) defame, abuse, harass, stalk, threaten or otherwise violate
the legal rights (such as rights of privacy and publicity) of others;

[...]

I believe this is why Gawker Stalker is no longer around.

