If you’re a frequent user of Twitpic, you might be saddened to hear that the service will be shutting down effective on the 25th of September. According to Twitpic’s founder, Noah Everett, “A few weeks ago Twitter contacted our legal demanding that we abandon our trademark application or risk losing access to their API. This came as a shock to us since Twitpic has been around since early 2008, and our trademark application has been in the USPTO since 2009.”
For those unfamiliar, Twitpic is a photo sharing service that managed to gain a lot of traction many years ago. This was because back then, Twitter did not offer users the functionality in which they could share photos on Twitter, thus Twitter users who wanted to share photos had to turn to third-party services such as Twitpic.
However as per Twitpic’s statement, it seems that Twitter had contacted them and told them that they would lose access to Twitter’s API unless they abandon their trademark application, which seems to be a different story from what Twitter is claiming.
Twitter has since released a statement saying, “We encourage developers to build on top of the Twitter service, as Twitpic has done for years, and we made it clear that they could operate using the Twitpic name. Of course, we also have to protect our brand, and that includes trademarks tied to the brand.” Well regardless of who said what, we guess the service is closing.
Twitpic has since told users that they would be able to export all their photos and videos via a feature that the company plans on launching in the next few days.