The end is nigh

I'm sad to announce this, but the end is nigh. Xboxtweet will soon cease to exist due to a lack of resources (both my own free time, as well as on a server level).

In September 2008 I registered xboxtweet.com and soon after launched the service. I started writing the software for myself and some friends, but soon after launching it many more users signed up (~3500 active users now). The load on my home server became too much. I had to switch servers and that now also don't seem to be sufficient. More importantly, I simply lack time to support the many requests I receive on a daily base, especially now that my wife and I are expecting a little addition to our family.

Since other services exist that provide the same, if not more, there's no good reason I can find to keep xboxtweet.com alive. Raptr.com seems to be a good alternative in case you were wondering ;-)

I do heavily regret to pull the plug on xboxtweet. I had a lot of fun with it and would like to thank all of you who contributed either by pointing out flaws, helping out with templates or filing suggestions for new features.

I know I've almost dropped xboxtweet before in the past, but now it's for real.

"When exactly will xboxtweet die?"
Any day. As soon as I find the time to switch off all systems etc. etc.

"Can you open source xboxtweet?"
Although I'm a strong believer in open source, I'm not going to release the code out in the open, simply because I want to prevent the shame of the -in places- terribly horrible code.

"Can I buy xboxtweet?"
Make me an offer and I'll think about it ;)

I hope you guys enjoyed xboxtweet as much as I have and hope you all find a new way of tweeting your achievements. Although I'll have to disappoint you, I probably do your followers a favor ;-)

T-Shirt design winner!

A lot of you have voted on the XboxTweet T-Shirt design entries, and I followed your votes by declaring the winner to be ...

...

BOTH Doney and Paaaaaaaaaaul!

The votes were too close to make one design stick out (20 vs. 21) so I've decided to declare both entries to be a winner. Doney and Paaaaaaaaaaul, please send me a DM on twitter with your email addresses, so we can get these shirts to the printer and, more important, to you.

Contratulations!

May we have your votes on the designs?

Again, a poll. This time, I ask you to vote for the best merchandise design. The nominations (ordered by date received):

http://bit.ly/dCvXmN (by Doney)

http://grab.by/2zQ8 (by Paaaaaaaaaaul)

Please cast your vote on the right of this blog.

Twazzup invites, grab one while you can!

For a while, I've been using Twazzup as a Twitter client and am enjoying it very much! Now the fine folk of Twazzup have granted me with 100 invites to try out their beta client (it's web-based)!

So, follow this link and sign up while you can.

And of course, let's all thank @sphilipakis for handing out the invites to us.

New poll: URL shorteners

Again, I'll throw a poll at you guys. Since the beginning, XboxTweet has been using TinyURL to shorten the xboxtweet.com links, but is this what you want?

The poll consists of four choices: Switch to bit.ly (the popular service); keep tinyurl; some other service (please explain in the comments why it beats all the others) and the last option is for those of you that can't care less, as long as it works ;-)

So, Americas, Europe, Africa, Asia and Australia, may we have your votes please?

Be creative, win a shirt!

As the latest poll showed, at least some of us XboxTweet'ers want T-Shirts. So here we go! Another contest! Currently I'm looking at Zazzle as printer / provider (but suggestions are welcome).

Here's what you need to do: Download a guide file and design a cool XboxTweet T-Shirt!

What can you win? The winner will get the shirt he or she designed, and of course the winning design will be available for everyone else! Your design might end up on shirts in 30+ countries!

If I find more than one stunning design, I'll choose more than one winner ;-)

So, get creative and start designing! Mail your designs to support [at] xboxtweet [dot] com, or better yet, upload it somewhere and post a link here in the comments. Do this before March 1st to be able to win.

Happy Designing!

Fine print: of course you'll have to agree to allow XboxTweet to use your design.

XboxTweet merch?

Recently we've welcomed SLai23 as our 2500th active user and he was quick to respond with:

"all right! does that mean I get a t-shirt or something? lol"

Besides eternal fame, there's little I could offer, but it got me thinking. Why don't we have XboxTweet shirts? It'd be a heck of a lot easier to hand out with new contests and hey, it's just cool!

So I've added a poll on this website, asking for your thoughts on XboxTweet merchandise. If enough people are interested, we might even get some merch!

Please vote :-)

... I feel a design contest coming up ;-)