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Why is Nitter being discontinued now, but wasn't before? #1175

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throwaway59378 opened this issue Feb 16, 2024 · 13 comments
Open

Why is Nitter being discontinued now, but wasn't before? #1175

throwaway59378 opened this issue Feb 16, 2024 · 13 comments

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@throwaway59378
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In the past, Nitter has been down due to issues with Twitter several times, but this time it's being discontinued. Is there any reason why it's considered dead this time?

@pin-grid-array
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All public Nitter instances will soon be dead. The reason has to do with the inability to create guest accounts.

However, it is still possible to use Nitter by running an instance yourself and connecting your Twitter account's username and password. I collected various instructions provided by some kind people on how you can do it, if you want to try.

But requiring the use of an actual Twitter account in order to use Nitter is contrary to part of the original mission of Nitter—to create a privacy-focused alternative to using Twitter. So in a way, we could say that Nitter as we originally knew it really is dead this time.

@throwaway59378
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throwaway59378 commented Feb 16, 2024

I'm aware of guest accounts being discontinued, but Nitter went down several times before, like when Twitter started requiring you to make an account, yet the project wasn't discontinued those times like it is now. What I'm asking is why it's being discontinued this time while it wasn't in the past.

@iiTzRichie
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However, it is still possible to use Nitter by running an instance yourself and connecting your Twitter account's username and password. I collected various instructions provided by some kind people on how you can do it, if you want to try.

Would that instance be able to be used by other people, or is it just for yourself?

@pin-grid-array
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I'm aware of guest accounts being discontinued, but Nitter went down several times before, like when Twitter started requiring you to make an account, yet the project wasn't discontinued those times like it is now. What I'm asking is why it's being discontinued this time while it wasn't in the past.

I guess it's because having Twitter account is an absolute requirement now while it wasn't before. There are no known behind-the-scenes ways to access Twitter data anymore, unlike in the past.

Would that instance be able to be used by other people, or is it just for yourself?

I haven't created my own instance so I haven't experienced this myself, but based on what others have said, you get rate-limited quickly so creating a public instance is impossible. You can only use it for yourself.

@react-cad-dev
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I'm confused why the project has been declared dead. The functionality to view individual tweets stopped working, but other than that nitter worked fine. The ability to view users' timelines without creating an account was invaluable.

I'm disappointed all the public instances have shut down when, for my use case at least, nitter still worked perfectly and I was using it all the time. I will absolutely be setting up a private instance, without bothering to link it to a user account, because nitter with only public api access is still a good service.

@iiTzRichie
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Would that instance be able to be used by other people, or is it just for yourself?

I haven't created my own instance so I haven't experienced this myself, but based on what others have said, you get rate-limited quickly so creating a public instance is impossible. You can only use it for yourself.

Hmm. Hopefully someone can make a YT video tutorial (for dummies, like myself). I never even really knew how to create my own instance. I have no knowledge of any kind of coding and all that.

@hashirkz
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hashirkz commented Feb 19, 2024

I'm confused why the project has been declared dead. The functionality to view individual tweets stopped working, but other than that nitter worked fine. The ability to view users' timelines without creating an account was invaluable.

I'm disappointed all the public instances have shut down when, for my use case at least, nitter still worked perfectly and I was using it all the time. I will absolutely be setting up a private instance, without bothering to link it to a user account, because nitter with only public api access is still a good service.

see #1155

ppl have alr mentioned this but nitter.net has closed because twitter has deprecated making guest accounts and all existing guest accounts will expire 30 days after creation. without guest accounts nitter can no longer sign requests to twitters endpoints and wont be able to pull tweets / profiles. the only way to sign requests to twitter now is with a real twitter account using the bearer and crsf cookie/token. nitter will break in 30 days so zedeus pulled the plug. you can still set up a private nitter instance and sign requests using your own twitter accounts this may be against twitter TOS so be careful.

@notherenorthere
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I'm confused why the project has been declared dead. The functionality to view individual tweets stopped working, but other than that nitter worked fine. The ability to view users' timelines without creating an account was invaluable.
I'm disappointed all the public instances have shut down when, for my use case at least, nitter still worked perfectly and I was using it all the time. I will absolutely be setting up a private instance, without bothering to link it to a user account, because nitter with only public api access is still a good service.

see #1155

ppl have alr mentioned this but nitter.net has closed because twitter has deprecated making guest accounts and all existing guest accounts will expire 30 days after creation. without guest accounts nitter can no longer sign requests to twitters endpoints and wont be able to pull tweets / profiles. the only way to sign requests to twitter now is with a real twitter account using the bearer and crsf cookie/token. nitter will break in 30 days so zedeus pulled the plug. you can still set up a private nitter instance and sign requests using your own twitter accounts this may be against twitter TOS so be careful.

I'm gonna miss nitter! I really hate twt, Setting up a private nitter is possible for programmers but def not those of us who are regular nitter users who know nothing about it.

Thanks for every thing you've done you guys! as ironic as it may seem, you helped keeping twt alive at least for those of us who used to use twt for what it used to be before it turned into the absolute useless trash

@sruPL
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sruPL commented Feb 19, 2024

To be honest, all things privacy, but I would still prefer nitter over X if I could use my account and continue to use it. Why?

  1. It's faster, clean, neat.
  2. No ads
  3. Can follow people's profiles without all the noise and clutter. I usually set up a few tabs with people's profiles that I follow and just refresh them to check for new posts.

@ixfd64
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ixfd64 commented Feb 19, 2024

One possible solution is to set up a website where people can crowd-source shared logins. This would allow a third-party tool to request credentials from the server until it finds one that works. However, knowing Twitter, they'd probably ban such accounts rather quickly.

On a related note, I wrote to Bugmenot.com a while ago asking them to unblock Twitter as it is no longer a website where "users register only to add/change content (but not to view)." However, they never got back to me.

@pirkka
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pirkka commented Feb 23, 2024

thanks for all the nitter, just asking if it would be legal to create a mirror site for twitter? it's public information, but would it be legal to re-host it en masse?

@aaferrari
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One possible solution is to set up a website where people can crowd-source shared logins.

Well, Aurora Store has the token dispensers for anonymous logins (this FAQ explains better how it works). How viable would it be to implement something like this for Nitter?

@olsonperrensen
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One possible solution is to set up a website where people can crowd-source shared logins.

Well, Aurora Store has the token dispensers for anonymous logins (this FAQ explains better how it works). How viable would it be to implement something like this for Nitter?

Any update

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