What Impact Does Twitter’s ‘Rate Limit Exceeded’ Have on Users?
Elon Musk’s Twitter account has implemented a temporary restriction on the number of tweets users can view per day. This decision has faced criticism and may potentially hinder the platform’s ability to attract advertisers.
The restriction, which is set to “address extreme data scraping and system manipulation,” is the latest change at Twitter, which Musk bought last year for $44 billion.
What does the latest change mean and what are the alternatives for Twitter?
How will the changes affect users?
Users cannot view tweets without logging into the platform. Verified accounts can now read 6,000 messages per day, unverified accounts 600 messages, and new unverified accounts 300 messages. Users will then receive a message that says “speed limit exceeded”.
Musk has said that the limit will “soon” rise to 10,000 verified, 1,000 unverified and 500 new unverified.
He has worked to make Twitter’s revamped proven service more attractive. Musk made Twitter Verified — special badges previously given to prominent profiles — a paid subscription, introducing tiers like gray, blue, and gold badges.
Why did Musk set the limit?
Musk said the limits would help prevent massive amounts of data from being scraped from Twitter by just about anyone — from AI companies and startups to tech scams.
“It’s pretty annoying that a large number of servers need to be brought online in an emergency just to facilitate the outrageous valuation of some AI startups,” he said in a tweet.
The technology behind generative AI tools like ChatGPT is trained on massive amounts of data taken from the Internet, helping to produce everything from poems to images.
What are users saying?
Several Twitter users complained that “#TwitterDown” and “RIP Twitter” have been popping up on the social network’s website over the past couple of days.
Accounts of news agencies, journalists and monitoring services are particularly affected by the limits, as they rely on checking thousands of tweets every day.
The National Weather Service said it may not be able to see tweets about severe weather and related damage and asked subscribers to use its office phone numbers instead.
What are the options?
Twitter-like platforms like Bluesky and Mastodon are the main options. They saw a spike in users and activity shortly after Musk announced the restrictions.
Bluesky, which was launched by Twitter co-founder Jack Dorsey and is now in beta, said it saw “record traffic” on Saturday and temporarily suspended new signups.
Mastodon’s active user base grew by 110,000 that day, its creator and CEO Eugen Rochko said.
