Twitter Imposes Strict Reading Limits Amid Massive Data Scraping
Elon Musk limits how many posts users can read per day as Twitter fights off aggressive data scraping from AI companies. The sudden restrictions cause widespread error messages and user frustration across the platform.
Elon Musk's Twitter imposes strict daily reading limits on users as the platform battles extreme data scraping from artificial intelligence companies. Verified accounts currently face a cap of 6,000 posts per day, while unverified and new accounts are restricted to 600 and 300 posts, respectively. Musk states these limits are a temporary emergency measure to stop AI startups from pillaging data and degrading the service for normal users.
The aggressive restrictions result in widespread "rate limit exceeded" and "cannot retrieve tweets" error messages for countless visitors. Frustrated users take to trending topics with hashtags like #TwitterDown and "WTF Twitter," while outage tracking sites log thousands of reported problems. These technical disruptions follow a Friday change that forced non-logged-in visitors to a sign-up page instead of the usual Explore feed.
This chaotic episode represents just the latest in a series of turbulent technical issues under Musk's ownership. The platform experiences continuous upheaval through mass layoffs, impulsive policy reversals, and sudden system changes. Musk insists that any social media platform allowing unauthenticated access inevitably becomes a bot-filled hellscape, justifying his drastic and immediate actions to secure the network.