Do you monitor your brand and what’s being said about you? I’m guessing that you do – after all, you need to know what’s being said in your name, particularly in our fast-paced connected worlds.
I’m beginning to wonder about Twitter, though.
The micro-blogging company isn’t having a great time of things at the minute. From network stability issues to the recent malware attack, it’s been a testing time for Twitter.
Thanks to a new website, it could become even more testing – yet Twitter doesn’t seem particularly bothered. Should they be?
Fake-Twitter.com is a site that allows you to choose any Twitter user and make a fake Twitter status update. This is then posted like a tweet and, at a glance, looks like the real thing. If you’re not a Twitter user, you might even think it’s the genuine article.
Even if you see that it’s fake, I’m guessing that the fake tweet will show up in search engine results and look like a genuine post. You can see how damaging this could be to someone’s name or brand. So, far from being a little bit of fun, Fake-Twitter.com is ethically questionable.
So where is Twitter in all of this? So far, nowhere – yet don’t you think they should be taking action against the site, in order to protect its own users?
Even if that was legally a gray area, Twitter could take down Fake-Twitter.com for copyright breach on the site’s design, which is just like the real Twitter set up.
Maybe there’s no response yet because Twitter is busy dealing with the malware attacks on their servers – so here’s some help to the Twitter team:
- The Fake-Twitter domain is registered at GoDaddy.com under the name of Ryan Cornwell of Columbus, OH. You can get full details – address, email, etc – here.
- The site itself is hosted at DreamHost.com, which is located in Brea, CA – so there should be no issues with overseas hosting legalities.
- One of the co-creators of Fake-Twitter.com is Twitter user @topherchris – I’m sure you could ask him about Fake-Twitter.com, abuse of the site and the design copyright issue.
There’s not a lot more I can (or should) do – I’m not a Twitter employee and I have my own tasks at hand. But I am a Twitter user that cares about the Twitter community, as well as the potential damage this could do to individuals and brands,? hence the collection of information for you.
It only took me about half an hour to collate all the details and do some digging on the people behind it.
The question now, Twitter, is what are you going to do about it?
How about you? Should Twitter be taking action or is Fake-Twitter.com just a harmless joke?
- Update April 13 – As of 9.00pm EST, the Fake-Twitter website is closed following an official takedown request from Twitter.
