Earlier this week Twitter announced a stronger crackdown on inactive accounts. Under its inactrive account policy it would begin to free up usernames and delete inactive accounts.
While this may be good news for those who have been waiting years to snatch up their username of choice, the decision raised questions around accounts of the deceased.
The social media has now apologised and addressed the issue.
[referenced url=”https://gizmodo.com.au/2019/11/some-pretty-good-twitter-handles-that-may-soon-become-available/” thumb=”https://i.kinja-img.com/gawker-media/image/upload/t_ku-large/gcytyuqpx5xzprrxsjw3.png” title=”Some Pretty Good Twitter Handles That May Soon Become Available” excerpt=”Twitter is gearing up to remove scads of inactive accounts. That means one thing and one thing only: one lucky idiot might soon have rights to the handle @sexhaver, leaving the rest of us (losers; virgins) in their digital dust.”]
Twitter’s original announcement regarding inactive accounts was scarce on some details, such as how it would handle the accounts of people who had died and which areas would experience the crackdown first.
“As part of our commitment to serve the public conversation, we’re working to clean up inactive accounts to present more accurate, credible information people can trust across Twitter. Part of this effort is encouraging people to actively log-in and use Twitter when they register an account, as stated in our inactive accounts policy,” a spokesperson told The Verge.
“We have begun proactive outreach to many accounts who have not logged into Twitter in over six months to inform them that their accounts may be permanently removed due to prolonged inactivity.”
There was also no mention of how or when recouped usernames would become available to users again.
While not all of these questions have been answered yet, Twitter has addressed the issue of deceased accounts after public outcry online.
Earlier today the Twitter Support account clarified its position on the proposed cleanup of inactive accounts.
It stated that at the present time its inactive account policy will only be implemented in the EU.
It also admitted to having been blind to the issue of accounts belonging to deceased people. Twitter pledged to not remove any inactive handles until the platform had a way to memoralise accounts.
We’ve heard you on the impact that this would have on the accounts of the deceased. This was a miss on our part. We will not be removing any inactive accounts until we create a new way for people to memorialize accounts.
— Twitter Support (@TwitterSupport) November 27, 2019
There’s no current word on when Twitter will begin enforcing its inactive account policy in Australia.