Creating TweetReal and the legal forces that led to its end
The story of how I created this iOS app and how I was forced to take it down
The first TweetReal Anniversary
It was October 2022…
… and the BeReal social network was at its peak, gaining popularity each day with many funny "bereals" going viral on all social media platforms. I noticed that numerous users were taking their bereals and sharing them on other platforms, like Twitter. This sparked an idea:
Why not create an app that allows sharing real moments directly on Twitter, bypassing the need to sign up for another social network?
That's how TweetReal was conceived, developed during my spare time over a few weeks.
Creating the MVP
The app MVP was very simple: users could sign in with their Twitter account and wait for a daily notification asking them to post a photo using both the front and rear cameras within a five-minute time frame, then tweet it directly from the app.
The app automatically included the #TweetRealApp hashtag in the tweets, enabling users to see what others were posting. (You can still search the hashtag if you're curious.)
The development of TweetReal began with the most challenging part: integrating Twitter's API for authentication. After tackling that, I focused on the camera functionality, which was a bit tricky since I had never worked with that API before. The final significant hurdle was designing the local notifications for every big timezone, to avoid disturbing users at night across different time zones.
After 2.5k lines of code the MVP was ready to launch!
I was overjoyed, having fun with friends, family, and random users posting their tweetreals. Later, even I introduced features like allowing users to add captions, change the position of the selfie or Live Activities to play around with the brand new Dynamic Island 🏝️
But the 2nd of December I received an email from Apple…
It was a notification relaying a complaint from BeReal's lawyers. They accused me of creating a copycat app, citing all the trademarks they had registered, including one I found rather absurd:
"The ability to take a picture with both the front and back camera of the user’s phone simultaneously."
As mentioned, TweetReal was a fun project without any intention of making money of it, so entering into a legal dispute was out of the question. Furthermore, Apple's warning struck a chord:
"Developers with a history of allegations of repeat infringement, or those who misrepresent facts to Apple and/or the Complainant, are at risk of termination from the Developer Program."
As far as I know, being banned from Apple can be irreversible, preventing you from opening another account under the same name.
This is the end 🎶
To avoid troubles, legal expenses, and the risk of having my developer account terminated, I decided to shut down TweetReal with a heavy heart 😭
Perhaps it was naive of me; a name change or some adjustments might have been enough to avoid a ban. However, I couldn't risk my developer account. Moreover, with all the mess later caused by Elon's changes to Twitter's API and the new exorbitant pricing, I would have likely needed to discontinue the app anyways.
Sometimes, I consider releasing a new version connected to the Mastodon API, named TootReal, but I'm hesitant to take such risks for a fun, free app. Maybe someday I will come back to it.
To be continue…
I made this SwiftUI boilerplate to launch iOS apps FAST 👇
