How new Twitter API rules could hinder war crimes research and rescue efforts - The Washington Post, 20 June 2023
ioi_ab's bookmarks 2023-06-20
Summary:
"Twitter’s recent decision under new owner Elon Musk to charge more than $500,000 annually for a once-free tool to analyze posts on the platform is hampering disinformation and war crimes research, and could slow rescue efforts during natural disasters, according to experts and nonprofit groups.
Since 2006, users have had unlimited access to the social media platform’s application programming interface, or API — allowing researchers to extract and analyze data that provided critical insights into the website’s role in election meddling and the spread of disinformation, as well as to gather and synthesize photographic and video evidence that could be used to indict potential war criminals in international tribunals.
Twitter announced in April that access to the API will now require a paid subscription, with those most useful to researchers ranging from $42,000 to $210,000 per month. The change has left many policy shops, NGOs, independent researchers and students without access...."