Transparency
We believe in being transparent about the services and technologies that power twttr. Here's everything you need to know about our infrastructure and dependencies.
🔴 Critical Services
These services are essential. If they fail, parts of twttr stop working.
| Service |
Purpose |
Provider |
| PostgreSQL |
Production database (users, tweets, follows) |
Heroku managed |
| Resend |
Email delivery for account confirmation |
Resend (resend.com) |
| Heroku |
Application hosting & runtime environment |
Heroku (heroku.com) |
| Scaleway Object Storage |
Image/avatar storage (S3-compatible) |
Scaleway (scaleway.com) — EU-hosted |
⚙️ Important Infrastructure
Core dependencies that power the application:
| Technology |
Purpose |
| Sinatra + Rack |
Web framework & HTTP server |
| Puma |
Application web server |
| BCrypt |
Password hashing & authentication |
| Rack CSRF Protection |
Security against Cross-Site Request Forgery attacks |
📊 Analytics (Optional)
Privacy-friendly analytics. Can be disabled without affecting functionality:
| Service |
Purpose |
Provider |
| Plausible Analytics |
Privacy-friendly web analytics (no cookies, GDPR compliant) |
Plausible (plausible.io) |
🔐 Environment Variables
The following environment variables are required in production:
| Variable |
Purpose |
Required? |
DATABASE_URL |
PostgreSQL connection string |
✅ Yes |
RESEND_API_KEY |
Email delivery API key |
✅ Yes |
SCALEWAY_ACCESS_KEY |
Scaleway API access key |
✅ Yes |
SCALEWAY_SECRET_KEY |
Scaleway API secret key |
✅ Yes |
SCALEWAY_BUCKET_NAME |
S3 bucket name for avatar storage |
✅ Yes |
SCALEWAY_REGION |
Scaleway region (e.g., fr-par, nl-ams) |
✅ Yes |
PORT |
HTTP port (set by Heroku) |
Auto-set |
🌍 Data Residency
- Database: Hosted on Heroku (US-based)
- Avatars: Hosted on Scaleway Object Storage (Paris, France — EU-hosted)
🇪🇺 Migration to EU Infrastructure
We currently rely on the following US-based services:
- Heroku (Salesforce) — Application hosting & PostgreSQL database
- Resend — Transactional email delivery
We are actively working on migrating all services to EU-based providers to ensure full GDPR compliance and data sovereignty. Potential alternatives we are evaluating:
Avatar storage is already EU-hosted via Scaleway Object Storage (Paris). Our goal is to have zero US-based dependencies by end of 2026.
📜 Twitter Feature History & twttr Status
A comprehensive timeline of every major Twitter/X feature and whether twttr has implemented it. Features marked with ✅ twttr are available on this platform.
Legend: ✅ = implemented in twttr | — = not implemented | Sign in to vote on features!
2006 — The Beginning
| twttr |
Feature |
Date |
Details |
Community Vote |
| ✅ |
Following/Followers |
July 15, 2006 |
Core social graph feature at public launch. Users follow others to see their tweets in a personal timeline. |
shipped
|
| ✅ |
Public Timeline |
July 15, 2006 |
A firehose of all public tweets. Twitter later removed this due to scale; twttr still has it. |
shipped
|
| ✅ |
User Profiles |
July 15, 2006 |
Personal profile pages showing a user’s tweets, bio, and follower/following counts. |
shipped
|
| ✅ |
Direct Messages |
2006 (SMS), 2008 (web) |
Private one-to-one messaging. Originally SMS-only, moved to web in 2008. |
shipped
|
| — |
SMS Integration |
2006 |
Tweeting via text message. The original posting method before the web interface became dominant. |
67%
(6)
|
2007 — Hashtags & @Replies Emerge
| twttr |
Feature |
Date |
Details |
Community Vote |
| ✅ |
Hashtags (#) |
August 23, 2007 |
Proposed by Chris Messina. Initially met with skepticism. Twitter didn’t officially support clickable hashtags until 2009, but the convention started here. |
shipped
|
| ✅ |
@Replies (user convention) |
2007 |
Users organically started using @username to direct messages at others. Twitter hadn’t built this feature — the community invented it. |
shipped
|
| — |
SXSW Breakout |
March 12, 2007 |
Twitter went from 20,000 to 60,000 tweets/day during SXSW Interactive. The event that put Twitter on the map. |
100%
(2)
|
2008 — @Replies Official
| twttr |
Feature |
Date |
Details |
Community Vote |
| ✅ |
@Replies (official) |
May 2008 |
Twitter officially adds @reply support, recognizing the user convention and building it into the interface with dedicated tabs. |
shipped
|
| ✅ |
DMs as web feature |
2008 |
Direct Messages move beyond SMS to become a proper web inbox with read/write capability. |
shipped
|
2009 — Retweets, Trending, Verified, Lists
| twttr |
Feature |
Date |
Details |
Community Vote |
| ✅ |
Trending Topics |
Early 2009 |
Real-time display of the most talked-about subjects on the platform. Later customized by location. |
shipped
|
| — |
Verified Accounts (blue checkmark) |
June 2009 |
Launched after a lawsuit by St. Louis Cardinals manager Tony La Russa over an impersonation account. The blue check became a cultural symbol. |
0%
(8)
|
| — |
Lists |
October 30, 2009 |
Curate groups of accounts into categorized timelines. Biz Stone announced with “There’s a List for That.” |
100%
(1)
|
| ✅ |
Favorites (star icon) |
2009–2010 |
The yellow star. Used to bookmark or show appreciation for tweets. Later changed to “Likes” (heart) in 2015. |
shipped
|
2010 — Promoted Tweets, New Twitter, Inline Media
| twttr |
Feature |
Date |
Details |
Community Vote |
2011 — Photo Sharing, t.co, Who to Follow
| twttr |
Feature |
Date |
Details |
Community Vote |
| ✅ |
URL auto-linking in tweets |
June 7, 2011 |
t.co URL shortening rolls out to all users. All links automatically wrapped and clickable. (twttr uses direct links instead of a shortener.) |
shipped
|
| — |
Native photo sharing (pic.twitter.com) |
August 2011 |
Upload photos directly in tweets. Previously users relied on TwitPic, yFrog, and other third-party services. |
100%
(3)
|
| — |
“Who to Follow” suggestions |
2011 |
Algorithm-based account recommendations based on user interests and social graph connections. |
50%
(2)
|
| — |
Connect & Discover tabs |
December 8, 2011 |
Major redesign (“Fly”). New navigation with Connect and Discover alongside the Home tab. |
|
2012 — Vine Acquired, New Bird Logo
| twttr |
Feature |
Date |
Details |
Community Vote |
| — |
New bird logo (“Larry the Bird”) |
June 5, 2012 |
The text wordmark is removed. The redesigned bird becomes Twitter’s sole symbol. |
|
| — |
Vine acquired |
October 5, 2012 |
Twitter acquires Vine, a short-form video clip service. Vine launches January 2013 and is shut down in October 2016. |
|
2013 — Vine, Line Breaks, IPO
| twttr |
Feature |
Date |
Details |
Community Vote |
| — |
Vine (6-second looping videos) |
January 24, 2013 |
Standalone app for creating and sharing 6-second looping video clips. Became a cultural phenomenon. Discontinued 2016. |
100%
(1)
|
| — |
Line breaks in tweets |
March 2013 |
Tweets could now contain newlines for formatting. Previously all text ran together. |
100%
(2)
|
2014 — Profile Redesign, Hashflags
| twttr |
Feature |
Date |
Details |
Community Vote |
| — |
Facebook-style profile redesign |
April 2014 |
Full-width header image with parallax scrolling, profile picture and bio in a left column. Controversial. |
|
| — |
Hashflags (custom emoji for hashtags) |
June 2014 |
Introduced for FIFA World Cup. Special hashtags automatically generate custom emoji next to them. |
|
| — |
“While You Were Away” |
November 2014 (announced) |
Curated highlights of tweets you missed. First step toward a non-chronological timeline. |
|
2015 — Quote Tweets, Moments, Heart Replaces Star, Video, Polls
| twttr |
Feature |
Date |
Details |
Community Vote |
| — |
Native video upload |
January 27, 2015 |
Record and upload videos directly through the mobile app. |
|
| — |
Group Direct Messages |
January 27, 2015 |
DMs expand beyond 1:1 to support group conversations. |
|
| — |
Periscope (live streaming) |
March 9, 2015 |
Twitter acquires Periscope for live video. Integrated into the platform; shut down March 2021. |
|
| — |
Polls |
2015 |
Embedded polls in tweets allowing followers to vote on multiple-choice questions. |
|
| — |
Moments |
October 6, 2015 |
Curated collections of tweets about breaking news and events. Later replaced by the Explore tab in 2017. |
|
| — |
❤️ Like replaces ★ Favorite |
November 3, 2015 |
The star icon is replaced by a heart. “Favorites” become “Likes.” Twitter reports a 6% increase in engagement. One of the most controversial UI changes ever. |
|
2016 — Algorithmic Timeline, Character Limit Changes
| twttr |
Feature |
Date |
Details |
Community Vote |
| — |
Algorithmic timeline (non-chronological) |
Feb–March 2016 |
Recommended tweets become the default instead of reverse chronological. Users can opt out. twttr keeps it chronological, like God intended. |
0%
(1)
|
| — |
Alt text for images |
March 29, 2016 |
Up to 480 characters of description for accessibility. Important for screen reader users. |
|
| — |
Media no longer counts toward character limit |
May 24, 2016 |
Photos, videos, GIFs, polls, and quoted tweets stop counting against the 140-character limit. |
|
| — |
Vine discontinued |
October 2016 |
After 3 years, Vine stops accepting new posts. A generation mourns. |
|
2017 — 280 Characters, Threads, Explore Tab
| twttr |
Feature |
Date |
Details |
Community Vote |
| — |
Explore tab (replaces Moments) |
January 2017 |
Bundles Moments, trends, live video, and search into one place. |
|
| — |
@usernames excluded from character limit in replies |
March 30, 2017 |
Replying to someone no longer wastes characters on the @mention. (twttr still includes @mention in character count — keeping it real.) |
|
| — |
Circular profile pictures |
June 15, 2017 |
Twitter switches from square to circular profile pictures. A design trend that swept all social media. |
|
| — |
280-character limit |
November 7, 2017 |
The character limit doubles from 140 to 280. Tested since September. twttr keeps the original 140-character limit — constraints breed creativity. |
|
2018 — Bookmarks, Account Cleanup
| twttr |
Feature |
Date |
Details |
Community Vote |
| — |
Bookmarks |
February 28, 2018 |
Privately save tweets without liking or retweeting. The feature people had been using Favorites for all along. |
|
| — |
Locked/suspended accounts removed from follower counts |
July 13, 2018 |
Visible drops in follower numbers for popular accounts. Some celebrities lost millions of followers overnight. |
|
2019 — New Web Interface, Hide Replies
| twttr |
Feature |
Date |
Details |
Community Vote |
| — |
New desktop web interface (PWA) |
March–July 2019 |
Vertical left-side navigation. The “Twitter Web App” progressive web app replaces the legacy 2014 design. |
|
| — |
Hide replies |
November 2019 |
Users can hide replies to their tweets. Hidden replies are still viewable behind an extra click. |
|
2020 — Fleets, Reply Controls, Voice Tweets
| twttr |
Feature |
Date |
Details |
Community Vote |
| — |
Reply controls (limit who can reply) |
August 11, 2020 |
Choose who can reply: everyone, followers only, or mentioned users only. |
|
| — |
Fleets (stories) |
November 17, 2020 |
Ephemeral posts that disappear after 24 hours. Instagram Stories for Twitter. Retired August 2021 due to low adoption. |
100%
(1)
|
2021 — Spaces, Twitter Blue, Communities, Super Follows
| twttr |
Feature |
Date |
Details |
Community Vote |
| — |
Fleets retired |
August 3, 2021 |
After only 8 months. The fastest feature deprecation in Twitter history. |
|
| — |
Super Follows (creator subscriptions) |
September 1, 2021 |
Creators can offer exclusive content to paying followers. |
0%
(2)
|
| — |
Communities (themed groups) |
September 8, 2021 |
Facebook Groups for Twitter. Tweet to specific community audiences. |
|
2022 — Edit Tweet, Musk Acquisition, Twitter Circle
| twttr |
Feature |
Date |
Details |
Community Vote |
| — |
Public view counts on tweets |
December 23, 2022 |
Impression counter visible on every tweet. Controversial — many users found it anxiety-inducing. |
|
2023 — Rebranding to X, Long-form Posts, Legacy Verification Removed
| twttr |
Feature |
Date |
Details |
Community Vote |
| — |
Third-party clients banned |
January 19, 2023 |
Twitterrific and Tweetbot killed overnight. An era ends. |
|
| — |
Long-form posts (Notes/Articles) |
February 2023 |
Up to 25,000 characters. Premium subscribers only. Twitter becomes a blogging platform. |
|
| — |
Algorithm open-sourced |
March 31, 2023 |
Twitter’s recommendation algorithm published on GitHub. Revealed that Elon’s tweets got a manual boost. |
|
| — |
Legacy verified checkmarks removed |
April 20, 2023 |
All pre-existing blue checks stripped. Verification now requires a Blue/Premium subscription. |
|
| — |
Twitter rebrands to “X” |
July 23, 2023 |
The bird logo is replaced with an X. The domain x.com begins redirecting. “Tweets” officially become “posts.” twttr keeps the bird. 🐦 |
|
| — |
Headlines removed from link previews |
October 4, 2023 |
Links in tweets only show an image and domain, no headline or description. Widely criticized. |
|
| — |
Audio & video calling |
October 25, 2023 |
Call other users directly within the platform. X tries to become a “super app.” |
|
2024 — Grok AI, Premium Tiers, Private Likes
| twttr |
Feature |
Date |
Details |
Community Vote |
| — |
Grok AI integration |
Early 2024 |
xAI’s chatbot integrated into X for Premium+ subscribers. AI answers appear alongside search results. |
|
| — |
X Premium tiers (Basic, Premium, Premium+) |
2024 |
Three subscription tiers with varying feature access and ad reduction. twttr remains free for everyone. |
|
| — |
Likes become private by default |
October 2024 |
Other users can no longer see what you’ve liked. A significant privacy change. twttr shows favorites publicly on profiles. |
|
2025 — xAI Acquisition
| twttr |
Feature |
Date |
Details |
Community Vote |
| — |
xAI acquires X Corp. |
March 2025 |
$33 billion. The social platform merges with Musk’s AI company. The “everything app” dream continues. |
0%
(1)
|
📋 Changelog
What we've shipped, newest first.
| Date |
What shipped |
Community request |
| 2026-03-21 |
Pin Tweet — Pin einen Tweet ans Top deines Profils. Klick auf 📌 bei einem eigenen Tweet. |
@timpritlove |
| 2026-03-21 |
Auto-Scaling (JudoScale) — Dynos skalieren automatisch bei Last, verhindert OOM-Crashes. |
— |
| 2026-03-21 |
Dark Mode — Follows system preference automatically; manual toggle ("Dark"/"Light") in the nav bar. Preference saved in localStorage. |
@ahsamuel, @314rate “Dark Mode” |
| 2026-03-21 |
Error pages — Custom 404 (ghost bird) and 500 (fail whale) pages styled after classic Twitter error pages, adapted in twttr green. Cloudflare Worker intercepts 5xx from Heroku. |
— |
| 2026-03-21 |
AJAX likes & retweets — Liking and retweeting updates instantly without reloading the page. |
— |
| 2026-03-21 |
Follow back button — One-click follow-back on your own followers page. |
— |
| 2026-03-21 |
Remember me — Stay signed in for 30 days with a persistent session cookie. |
@vowe “Lass mich angemeldet” |
| 2026-03-21 |
2-Factor Authentication (TOTP) — Optional 2FA via Google Authenticator / Authy, incl. backup codes. Also secured the admin panel with session-based auth + TOTP. |
@ralf “2fa aber bitte keine Passkeys” |
| 2026-03-21 |
Error monitoring (Sentry) — Automatic error tracking so bugs get noticed before users report them. |
— |
| 2026-03-19 |
Retweet & favorite counts — Retweet and like counts shown on every tweet. |
@timpritlove “Anzeigen wie viele Retweets ein Tweet hat” |
| 2026-03-19 |
Tweet deletion — Delete your own tweets. |
@bebal “Löschfunktion, aus Gründen” |
| 2026-03-19 |
Reply threads — Reply to tweets, thread view, reply counter. |
— |
| 2026-03-19 |
Direct Messages — Private messages between mutual followers. |
— |
| 2026-03-19 |
Real-time timeline — New tweets appear live via Server-Sent Events. |
— |
🛡️ Security
- All passwords are hashed using BCrypt
- CSRF protection enabled on all POST/PUT/DELETE requests
- Email confirmation required for account activation
- Emails delivered via Resend (DKIM, SPF configured)
Last updated: March 2026 | This page is automatically updated when our infrastructure changes.
Disclaimer & Satire Notice:
twttr is a satirical art project and April Fools' joke. It is
not a real social network and is
not affiliated with, endorsed by, or connected to Twitter, X Corp., or any of their subsidiaries in any way.
This project is a humorous homage to the early days of Twitter (circa 2006) — back when it was still called "twttr" and microblogging was a wild new idea. It is intended purely for entertainment and nostalgia purposes. No trademark infringement is intended.
Looking for the real thing? The official platform formerly known as Twitter is now
X — visit
x.com for the official service.
