Twitter has introduced a temporary “reading limit” for all users on the number of tweets they can see in a day.
Site owner Elon Musk announced the move on Saturday afternoon to combat what he called “extreme levels" of data scraping on the platform.
It came after several hours of many users reporting that they could not refresh posts or see their timelines.
Announcing the new limit, Musk said that verified accounts are limited to reading 6,000 posts a day while unverified accounts are limited to reading 600 posts a day.
New unverified accounts will be limited to just 300 posts a day.
He added: “Temporary limits mean the issue should be resolved very very very soon. Meanwhile all you great people can walk 10k steps per day to remain healthy and smart.”
To address extreme levels of data scraping & system manipulation, we’ve applied the following temporary limits:
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) July 1, 2023
- Verified accounts are limited to reading 6000 posts/day
- Unverified accounts to 600 posts/day
- New unverified accounts to 300/day
It comes after Twitter announced that it will require users to have an account on the social media platform to view tweets in a move Musk called a “temporary emergency measure."
The entrepreneur has said that hundreds of organisations were scraping Twitter data “extremely aggressively", impacting user experience.
He said on Friday that the social media platform was “getting data pillaged so much that it was degrading service for normal users".
Musk’s ownership of Twitter has been marked by a number of changes, including an overhaul of the site’s verification system.
Under the old model, a blue checkmark on the site indicated that an account belonged to a notable public figure.
However, under the new system, the tick is given to those who subscribe to Twitter Blue, for $8 per month.
