How does changing your Twitter screen name affect the API?
-
I'm seeing some very strange behaviour on our site Lanyrd which I think is caused by people changing their screen names. I'm ending up with multiple records in the database that share the same Twitter ID but have different Twitter screen names. I was pretty sure I'd figured out what was going on - users were changing their screen name but Twitter was maintaining their original numeric ID. Then I started to spot some very weird edge cases. Here's a good example: the user mrmatthamm (Twitter ID 782912) apparently changed his screen name to matthamm at some point. I can look him up in the Twitter API by both his new matthamm screen name and his Twitter ID: http://api.twitter.com/1/users/show.json?id=782912 http://api.twitter.com/1/users/show.json?screen_name=matthamm Here's where things get weird: if I look up his OLD screen name it still exists, only it appears to have been assigned a brand new Twitter ID: http://api.twitter.com/1/users/show.json?screen_name=mrmatthamm says his ID is 22139920 Even weirder, both accounts still exist on Twitter! And the old account even has a Tweet pointing at the new account: http://twitter.com/mrmatthamm http://twitter.com/matthamm I don't understand why my system thinks both of these accounts share the same Twitter ID (782912) when in reality they have different IDs. Could it be that mrmatthamm changed his screen name to matthamm, then re-registered mrmatthamm so he could tweet about his new name?
-
Answer:
Hi Simon - yes, your suggested explanation sounds right. You could always ask matthamm. BTW, I used twitter.com:uid:N (where N is a Twitter uid) for the about values of FluidDB objects used by Tickery (http://tickery.net). You can put metadata there too if you like, of course. FluidDB is still pretty slow though. Here's a list of the tags (mainly Twitter friend info) on the FluidDB object with about value twitter.com:uid:42983 (my uid): curl http://fluiddb.fluidinfo.com/about/twitter.com:uid:42983 I wonder what percentage of people who change their screen_name make it shorter. I bet it's very high (allows you to write more and still be retweeted in full). Hope your travels are going well. Dopplr still has you as being in Barcelona :-)
Terry Jones at Quora Visit the source
Other answers
Once you rename a twitter account, the old name is instantly freed. It doesn't go into inactivity like it does if you delete a twitter account. He must have created a new twitter account in the place of his old one, with instructions to go to the new one, before someone else could snap it up. This way, people could still find him with old links.
Ben Atkin
Related Q & A:
- How do I make another screen name on Yahoo?Best solution by Yahoo! Answers
- How can i change my screen name?Best solution by Yahoo! Answers
- How do i delete my screen name on AOL?Best solution by Yahoo! Answers
- How do you change your screen name on Yahoo?Best solution by Yahoo! Answers
- How do you change your screen name on Yahoo messenger?Best solution by Yahoo! Answers
Just Added Q & A:
- How many active mobile subscribers are there in China?Best solution by Quora
- How to find the right vacation?Best solution by bookit.com
- How To Make Your Own Primer?Best solution by thekrazycouponlady.com
- How do you get the domain & range?Best solution by ChaCha
- How do you open pop up blockers?Best solution by Yahoo! Answers
For every problem there is a solution! Proved by Solucija.
-
Got an issue and looking for advice?
-
Ask Solucija to search every corner of the Web for help.
-
Get workable solutions and helpful tips in a moment.
Just ask Solucija about an issue you face and immediately get a list of ready solutions, answers and tips from other Internet users. We always provide the most suitable and complete answer to your question at the top, along with a few good alternatives below.