Tweetbot and Twitterrific Users Can Support the Developers by Declining Subscription Refunds

[ApplesAreSweet&Sour]

What anyone of us as individuals should do with their money is not for us to say.

But the assertion that these developers shouldn’t ask users to decline refunds or that everyone should automatically get a refund is absurd.

Let those that want to help do so.

It doesn’t matter how good or bad the businesses were run, or if these apps were feasible long term.

Give them the benefit of the doubt and help out if you can.

 

[Analog Kid]

There's no business reason to not take the refund, it's just a question of who's feeling charitable.

 

[Lioness~]

I have the bought, now useless, Tweetbot app. Can't recall even what it costed me.
Where can I get a refund? Just kidding.
Would never payed for a subscription for that app though.

But the bought app was worth it to make Twitter a better experience. Not using Twitter at all at the moment. It makes an even better experience.
Have nothing to do with either Musk or the service in itself. Just stopped using it, lost total interest from a personal level. Will I use it from a professional level later, who knows?!

 

[BrownyQ]

But take that $3-$4, times the number of people that subscribed (I won’t guess on the numbers) and that is a significant hit to the developers. Who may need to be finding new work.

So I guess my nature makes it difficult to “stand on principle” about paying for a service I am no longer getting in this situation. It isn’t like the developers chose to stop offering the service.

I think-- and while not entirely the fault of this one developer-- that they are seeing the backlash from an industry built on subscriptions. Subscriptions that are becoming as toxic to consumers as loot boxes and microtransactions are to the gaming industry. Sucks to be them, but they benefitted as much from subscriptions as anyone.

However, at the end of the day, they did build their empire on shifting sand. I'd be hard pressed to cry for them, especially since they operated their business knowing it was all a house of cards.

 

[Tech Haven]

That's an easy "Do not need a refund". Tweetbot was great.

Tweetbot was great - I abandoned Twitter once it was gone because the native experience sucks so much.

I believe the subscription was a negligible (to me) $5.99/year. Let Tapbots keep the money - as I'd have happily paid far more than that for such a useful app.

 

[ethanwa79]

They made millions off of subscriptions. Just ask for a refund.

As an indie app developer myself, being on the App Store for 14 years with a successful business, I question where you get your “millions” figure from.

 

[compwiz1202]

Not unauthorized at all. In fact in 2021 Twitter eased the language in the developer agreement around the use of these APIs for just these kinds of apps.

This makes me think of what Netflix is trying with sharing.

 

[techpr]

All the people in the first page of this thread are way out of context.

 

[ethanwa79]

LMFAO. They made tens of millions off subscriptions for an app that was a wrapper around unauthorized APIs from a 4th party service. They were dumb as rocks to actually believe this would go on indefinitely. Everyone is entitled to a refund.

“Tens of millions”…

Would love to know where you came up with that crazy number. I bet that’s not even REMOTELY true. $6/yr subs and making tens of millions? I don’t think so.

I’ve been an app developer for 14 years. I’d be shocked if the number were this high.

 

[ethanwa79]

If Apple would allow developers to charge for major upgrades (like we used to have in the olden days) then we wouldn’t need subscriptions.

As an app developer myself, this is the right take. I hate subscriptions and I hate that it’s how our society has progressed.

The majority of software should be paid upgrades. It will encourage better features from devs and take back software from being viewed as a “service” when most of the time it’s not, it’s a product.

 

[PauloSera]

Imagine believing you would get away with reselling someone else's service without paying them.

 

[Abazigal]

I declined the refund as well. Sucks that there isn’t the option to tip them one last time. But at least there’s the highest subscription tier for Ivory for help send a few extra dollars their way.

 

[Shasterball]

I mean let’s be honest most people on here balk at paying $0.99 cents for an app that is essential to them. I wouldn’t want them as my customers with this sort of attitude lol

I think that is the issue most developers are running into: no app is essential; alternatives exist.

 

[seanmcbay]

I’d be shocked if the leads of this app weren’t millionaires with how successful the app was for over a decade. It sucks how they were suddenly screwed by Musk but it’s not scummy to want a refund. lol

 

[Chazak]

You have to be pretty scummy to ask for a refund.

Hard to say how offensive that is. And the begging to keep your money when you are owed a refund is kind of sad.

Can you imagine Your local supermarket or any other business you patronize saying "Hey, I know we owe you money, but could you be a nice person and let us keep your money? I know we work and earn an income, but we want to take a piece of yours that we didn't earn."

What would you say if Apple or MS said that? I can only imagine it would not be permitted in this comments section.

 

[jchap]

About a year ago, I took my child to their weekly piano lesson. When we arrived at the door of the old house where the lessons were held, a lady in her eighties or so came to the door. We had never seen her, and she was apparently the mother of the piano teacher. She told us in a matter-of-fact tone that there would no longer be any piano lessons. The teacher had suddenly passed away over the night, due to a heart attack.

I had already paid the teacher for the upcoming month of lessons, certainly not a small sum although not especially expensive as far as such lessons go. The old lady tried to hand back the money the teacher had collected. I told her that was not necessary. She strongly insisted, as of course we had not taken those lessons yet and would never be able to. I felt very confused.

When that brief exchange was over and my child and I walked back home with a feeling of confusion and stunned sadness, I thought about the teacher's elderly mother, how I let her give me back my money and whether that was the right thing to do. In later days, I thought about the teacher's bereaved husband and family, about the grand piano and all those books and teaching equipment that still sat in the old teaching studio of that house, where no one would ever teach again. I thought of how the family would have to clean all this up, move out that piano from the second floor (not an easy task—the steep wooden stairway was far too narrow to accommodate a grand piano, and a hoist and crane would likely need to be hired), how they would need to sell the piano, close her business and then finally continue their lives in that house as if nothing had happened. Every day, I walk by the bereaved husband's home and see his car parked in front, the car that he and his wife, the deceased piano teacher had drove. I wondered how he ever coped with the sudden loss.

There may be no real point to this story in terms of the topic of this thread. I brought it up because reading this thread and the many comments reminded me of what I felt and still feel to this day for accepting the refund for the piano lessons my child could never take, even though the circumstances were totally beyond our control.

 

[Apple_Robert]

Did the developers have legal permission to use Twitter’s API ? If so, was Twitter legally obligated to give notice of cancellation of it’s services to the developers?

 

[olimerkido2]

Popular Twitter clients Tweetbot and Twitterrific stopped working overnight in January after Twitter disabled the API used by third-party apps. Twitter gave zero warning that the apps were being blocked from accessing Twitter content, and in fact made no statement on the situation for well over a week.

Twitter then officially updated its terms of service to ban all apps similar to the Twitter app. Twitter clients that had been operating for more than a decade were all of a sudden banned, with no communication from Twitter, no heads up, and with no way for the developers to figure out a way to carefully unwind their businesses and communicate the shutdown to customers.

Tweetbot and Twitterrific, two of the most used Twitter clients, had subscription offerings and thousands of customers that paid for subscriptions on a yearly basis. With the apps unable to function, pro-rated refunds are set to be automatically issued to subscribers next month, which will heavily impact businesses that had no warning their income stream would be cut off.

Those refunds are going to be paid largely by Tweetbot and Twitterific rather than Apple. As John Gruber points out on Daring Fireball, this is akin to a person getting fired and then having to pay back their last six months of salary. It is a significant financial blow to app developers put out of business by Twitter's snap decision.

Tweetbot and Twitterrific have teamed up to offer multiple options to customers who are due refunds, and customers who want to help need to do the following:

1. Open Tweetbot or Twitterrific (or redownload the apps if they've been deleted and open them).
   
2. Choose the "I don't need a refund button." Alternatively, for Tweetbot, choose to transfer the subscription over to the new Ivory app for Mastodon.

Because refunds are being issued automatically, Tweetbot and Twitterrific customers who have been happy with their service and want to help the developers out will have to manually opt out using this method.

Customers who do want a refund can do nothing and will receive a pro-rated refund on March 28. Anyone who does not hit that "I don't need a refund button" will get their money back for the months that were left on the subscription at the time that the apps stopped functioning.

The apps have already been unavailable for more than a month, which means Tweetbot and Twitterific have no way to contact customers who are likely no longer even opening up the apps, or who have already deleted them entirely. Many customers will be issued refunds without even electing to be refunded as it is an automatic process without the manual opt-out.

Twitterrific developers Iconfactory and Tweetbot developers Tapbots both have other apps, but Tweetbot and Twitterrific were their main apps. Apple will require them to pay between 70 and 85 percent of each refund, depending on how long each person was subscribed (70% for those subscribed for less than a year, and 85% for those subscribed over a year). Apple will pay the remaining 15 to 30 percent, as that is the cut that Apple had been taking from subscriptions.

Tapbots has already transitioned to Mastodon and offers the Ivory client on both iPhone and Mac, while Iconfactory is focusing on its other apps like Linea Sketch.

Article Link: Tweetbot and Twitterrific Users Can Support the Developers by Declining Subscription Refunds

Okay I’m seeing a lot of angry comments but it’s actually quite simple, you can choose to get a refund or not, up to you, no one is forcing you to not accept a refund or to accept, so really there shouldn’t be any angry complaints.

 

[Marie.D]

They knew the risks of building a business on top of another one like this. Look, I like the Tweetbot devs, they built something great, but from a pure business stance, I can’t allow myself to not ask for the refund. It’s dangerous to set a precedent like this and will open a giant can of worms about accountability.

If I pay for a service and the service is terminated, then I don’t see why they should get what is basically free money? They are a corporation, not my family, not my friends. My subscription isn’t a donation, it’s transactional in nature, I give and I receive. This feel like a donation. If people want to donate their remaining subscription sure go right ahead, have my blessing, but don’t you dare trying to pressure me into doing the same and calling me name, the worst of the worst or something akin to a basket of deplorables because we disagree and I don’t have feelings towards another corporation.

 

[Apple_Robert]

These devs have made millions on these apps over the years. They’re not going to be hurting. No one should feel bad about getting a refund.

They did get screwed over but they should sue Twitter.

Unless Twitter violated a contract with the developers, suing on emotion is rather costly and pointless.

 

[LawJolla]

Hard to say how offensive that is. And the begging to keep your money when you are owed a refund is kind of sad.

Can you imagine Your local supermarket or any other business you patronize saying "Hey, I know we owe you money, but could you be a nice person and let us keep your money? I know we work and earn an income, but we want to take a piece of yours that we didn't earn."

What would you say if Apple or MS said that? I can only imagine it would not be permitted in this comments section.

❄️🚨

 

[icanhazmac]

I’m pretty sure no one expected a nut case billionaire to buy the company and flip it upside down within weeks of doing so.

No one expected that huh? Perhaps if you are living under a rock, the purchase of Twitter was big news for quite a while. The devs of these apps knew this could happen and evidently Twitter started to discourage these apps in 2021, long before the big bad Elon, yet they still accepted subs and took the money.

What do you mean? The "service" they're providing is an app. You still have the app. The app still works exactly as it did before. You just can't use the app anymore, because Musk's Twitter doesn't answer the app anymore.If you expect to be able to cancel mid-year, maybe you shouldn't buy yearly subscriptions? Maybe you should have read the TOS?Technically, it's all the user's problem. These companies fulfilled all their obligations. It's just that they are shockingly decent about it and are offering to do what they think is the right thing, even if it bankrupts them. So, I absolutely hape a bunch of people pay them back in kindness, even if they don't have to.

WOW, victim blaming at its best. I would counter and state the obvious, the service was the functionality of the app, no one would buy an app that could almost complete a task but not quite. I would not expect to cancel mid-year but if something I paid for became useless mid-year I'd want a refund. Kindness? LOL, switch this around and imagine every subscribed user contacted either of these companies and said "hey I lost my job, through no fault of my own, but I love your app and would like to keep using it until I get a new job, can you refund me my sub but let me keep using your app?", what do you think the response would have been?

If that money is going to make or break you? I’m sorry to hear that, genuinely. But if that is the case, I would question why you are buying any subscription at all. But that is not my place.So I guess my nature makes it difficult to “stand on principle” about paying for a service I am no longer getting in this situation. It isn’t like the developers chose to stop offering the service.

I never used twitter nor these apps and I agree that the very small amount of money back is not going to make or break anyone. I do however question the motives of a company that built a sand castle at low tide and now that the tide came in they want their customers to give them a pass. They happily accepted subscriptions knowing as early as 2021 that the end was coming, long before teh Elon.

I think Twitterrific’s Sean Heber said it best:

“We are sorry to say that the app’s sudden and undignified demise is due to an unannounced and undocumented policy change by an increasingly capricious Twitter – a Twitter that we no longer recognize as trustworthy nor want to work with any longer.”

LOL, we don't want to work with them (Twitter) only because we can't.

 

[nickawhite]

As John Gruber points out on Daring Fireball, this is akin to a person getting fired and then having to pay back their last six months of salary.

Agree with the overarching idea of declining a refund to help the developers. Disagree with the analogy offered - no one is getting refunded for services already received, which would be the equivalent of asking to pay back months of a salary. If he means paying back future salary, it still doesn't make sense because the employees wouldn't have received future income for work not yet performed. From a semantic standpoint, a more appropriate analogy would be asking people to decline a refund from an airline after a flight is cancelled due to bad weather.

 

[sdf]

Fine for who? Those that found Twitter as they Utopia of censored cancelled opinion disagreement and source for propaganda curated news ?

Prior to changes that required you to pay attention to people you weren't following, Twitter was a wonderful source… assuming you curated your timeline.

My timeline was pretty much news free since I wasn't on Twitter for news.

 

[ThailandToo]

The thing is do we have to follow what Jon Gruber says is right for humanity? Right for ourselves? Right for politics? This is absurdity at its finest. Mac Rumors now think following Jon Gruber down his obscure thoughts on humanity and that we are all leftist radicals like himself is absurd. Mac Rumors should be an objective report of rumors not how to ensure a developer can keep my money when they don’t provide the services promised. And here’s the kicker, Gruber was a Musk fan before the Twitter takeover. Is Musk doing what’s right for Twitter by abolishing third-party apps? That’s his decision. He bought the company! He has a right to do with it what he will. And we all have a right to follow or not.

Chalk this up to Gruber Chowder!