why can't i follow Twitter friends from Mastodon?
This is a legit question.
If a major stumbling block for people joining Mastodon-based instances is that their friends aren't here, then why do we not yet have a way for folks to connect their Twitter accounts to fetch statuses from the folks they're following?
There's a lot of API hell, yes. But, we're halfway there with the crossposters (which provide a valuable service), so why not go further?
(Also this is not necessarily a GOOD idea, and the answer may very well be "because Twitter forbids it and it'll be API whack-a-mole once they figure out what's happening", but it's a question I've been wondering for over a year now.)
@soft_chomps i'm honestly surprised nobody has done it yet. i've thought about it, but i am not a web dev and this shit is confusing as fuck
nobody wanted to make it a reality
for what its worth though: i figured out a method where it's on a per user opt-in level
nobody will see twitter posts unless they want to
@rey i made a proof of concept last year (that doesn't even require the api) it's just no one (well not me) wants to actually deploy such thing because it could be pretty awful for the fediverse
@CobaltVelvet this i don't disagree with one bit.
the "how to make it not terrible and awful and destructive" part is... something requiring a lot of attention and discussion
@rey yeah i mean my conclusion was basically "let's just not"
Also, I can safely ask this question because the only person who can answer it authoritatively still has me blocked ^^
@rey Twitter doesn't like people using it's API to make another social network. They ask that you "Avoid Replicating the Core Twitter Experience" and they specifically say don't...
"Use Twitter Content or other data collected from users to create or maintain a separate status update, social network, private messaging or live broadcasting database or service"
@gulfie it's not being used to create or maintain, strictly speaking; merely to augment :)
but yeah, that's a pretty solid reason
@memnus @rey I don't really see an insurmountable obstacle—a backend that can pull in tweets can also find @username@twitter.com in posts and route that stuff appropriately.
I'm sure it's complex though, don't mean to minimize it—it's just… I wouldn't sign up for it. 😓
@rey i mean you pretty much covered the reasons why not