Twitter delays its plans to remove third-party apps like Tweetbots

Chill out guys, Talon, Tweetbot, and Tweetings are staying for now.

The people behind third-party Twitter clients Tweetbot, Twitterrific, Talon, and Tweetings are warning users that their apps could lose important features like push notifications and an auto-refresh timeline in June. The problem is that Twitter had announced that after June 19th it will be removing the “streaming services” that have enabled developers to implement these functions in their apps.

However, we don’t know exactly when this change will come. In response to the furor on Twitter, the company has announced it is “delaying the scheduled June 19th deprecation date.” In a thread, the developer relations account further said the company it “will provide at least 90 days notice from when the Account Activity API becomes generally available” and that “more specifics on timing [are] to come.”

It’s good news that Twitter is backing down, but there are still open questions about whether its new Account Activity API is robust enough for third-party Twitter apps to provide the same streaming services they now offer. So far Twitter hasn’t allowed outside developers to participate in the beta testing of that API.

The app developers are concerned that “many folks don’t realize that their favorite Twitter app is about to break, so awareness is the first step. Together, we may be able to get Twitter to constructively address this state of affairs before the June deadline.” If you want to sound off, @TwitterDev is the account to @. Or you can tweet your own thoughts with the hashtag #BreakingMyTwitter.