Where Do Tweets Go When They Die?

If you've been using Twitter for any significant amount of time, you've probably stopped at least once to wonder what happens to your tweets after they grow old and disappear off your timeline. Part of the answer is that even though Twitter doesn't allow you to access past your most recent 3,200 messages* (not even via the search function) they still remain up in the cloud to frolic in the pastures of 140-character Limbo. But their journey doesn't end there. Now, with the launch of some new software, all of your tweets are going to end up exactly where you figured they'd go eventually: into the databanks of advertisers.

That's the plan for the new DataSift service, which in collaboration with Twitter is going to be selling off a good chunk of your deceased tweets to companies for analysis and marketing purposes. Previously, Twitter had only allowed 30 days worth of messages to be sold off, as per their deal earlier this month with a similar service called Gnip. The new deal, however, expands that window to include up to two years of expired posts, and attempts to provide context for the clients requesting them.

This of course feeds into the idea that the Twitter service is slowly transforming into a sort of universal mood ring for the human race. Advertisers are betting on that, and they know that somewhere amid the tidal waves of banality and gratuitous online posturing lies precious data that can be decoded, quantified and exploited.

Fortunately online human activity isn't destined to end up solely as data points in a corporate spreadsheet. A few years back, the Library of Congress was also given access to the Twitter's enormous back catalog for more archival, less profit-driven purposes. Still, it all once again brings to light the question of tweet ownership — or ownership of anything online, for that matter.

Sharing is caring, for sure, but there still remains an understandable discomfort with the idea of being forced to share content you've created but can no longer access yourself. Then again, we should all be familiar with the devil's bargain we're making with social media by now (if you aren't the customer you're the product, etc) so if you choose to keep making tweets, just don't expect to be able to give them a proper burial.

Oh, and advertisers: Have fun trying to monetize all our Horse_ebooks retweets.

EDIT 2/29/12 15:25 – The availability of tweets is dependent on number of tweets sent (up to 3,200), not date sent. Thanks for clarifying @DeMarko.