Why I Brought 12 Square Feet of Cake to Twitter HQ last Friday

by tynan • 16 years ago

24 24 16 years ago

there• 16 years ago

Soon enough one guy gave me instructions on how to file a ticket

which is all he really needed to do to get the username.

i got @jcs the same way a couple months ago: open a ticket, ignore the auto-reply email telling you twitter doesn't free up unused names, reply again saying you want the username looked into for inactivity. in a couple days they'll email back letting you know whether the account is inactive enough for deletion. if so, they'll delete it and you'll have to quickly change your username to the new one (since they won't directly hand over an account except in the case of trademark infringement).

tseabrooks• 16 years ago

Probably true... but who doesn't love cake? It's a heck of a way to show appreciation for the service if nothing else.

maxstoller• 16 years ago

I had a similar experience, except I sent a friendly snail mail letter instead of a cake. A couple days later a Twitter employee transferred the username to me and responded to my support ticket thanking me for the letter.

seltzered2• 16 years ago

While I love your blog tynan, I have a question for twitter: Since when did it become ok to get someone else's twitter handle just due to inactivity? And if the change occurred in only five minutes, was there any warning to the existing user?

Domain names operate on a principle where you pay for your name every year, and get several warning emails that you will lose your account if you fail to pay.

Edit: read JCS's post, makes sense as long as they clearly state how inactive you must be. That said, could you get kicked off of twitter if you merely use it to "lurk" your friend's protected tweets?

phjohnst• 16 years ago

See Twitter's inactive account policy here:

http://support.twitter.com/groups/33-report-a-violation/topi...

In general though it looks like they would like you to have a serious claim to the mark (ie US or Intl registered trademark) before they'll hand it over.

seltzered2• 16 years ago

thanks!

tynan6• 16 years ago

They actually told me specifically that they'd check to make sure he wasn't just logging in and reading other tweets with the account.

jarin• 16 years ago

Back when I first signed up, I had @jarin. Then later on (like an idiot), I changed it to @jarinudom when I was trying to unify all of my logins. I later realized the error of my ways, only to find out that someone got @jarin, tweeted once, and abandoned it.

About a year of filing tickets later (about once a month, explaining that I used to have the name that I wanted and that it was no longer active), I saw an article on TechCrunch about Twitter deleting the inactive @ericschmidt account so that Eric Schmidt could have it. So I filed one last ticket, linking to the TechCrunch article and saying "Hey, I'm the head of a company too (albeit a much smaller one)!" and things like that, and 5 minutes later I had it.

Luc• 16 years ago

When it comes down to it, this is just attention whoring, isn't it? He did this because it fits his narrative of being the wacky, unconventional guy, who can also advise you on how to pick up women you used to consider out of your league. Barf.

tynan6• 16 years ago

I did it because emailing a few times didn't work, I wanted to do something nice in return (preemptively, I guess), and I think doing stuff like this is fun.

alnayyir5• 16 years ago

http://i.imgur.com/mHyMB.png

Stop signing your posts, you're only proving his point.

We can move on to doing this kind of analysis with your site if you'd like to persist in pretending you're not one of 1,000 other people on the internet with the same personality blog about how OH SO RANDOM and INTERESTING you are.

swombat• 16 years ago

My friend Christophe, who offered to video everything, was there, as was Jerry from The Cake Gallery, a local business that specializes in penis cakes.

Wait, what?

Penis cakes?

http://thecakegallerysf.com/

3-D Cakes 3-Dimensional cakes are popular whether it’s a simple Barbie Cake or an elaborate Wedding Cake. Adults Only, X-Rated Cakes or our most provocative creations are adult in nature. Our X-Rated themes range from male and female body parts to any sexual depiction your demented mind can create.

Nice.

mxavier• 16 years ago

Pretty funny coincidence that he'd have yet another thing in common with the Larry David/Curb Your Enthusiasm situation he found himself in. There's a whole episode of CYE about penis cakes (Meet The Blacks).

maukdaddy• 16 years ago

This blog looks like a MySpace page.

maxawaytoolong• 16 years ago

I don't understand why these cakes were bought by someone who goes on at length about why sugar is bad for you.

tynan6• 16 years ago

I know, it's ironic. I chose cakes because everyone besides me likes cake.

Why I Brought 12 Square Feet of Cake to Twitter HQ last Friday

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