Jack Dorsey apologizes for Twitter glitch forcing some users to follow Trump’s @POTUS

Twitter chief Jack Dorsey today apologized for what he says were technical problems causing some Twitter users to involuntarily follow the @POTUS account as it was handed over to Donald Trump. As Sarah Perez reported here yesterday, Twitter users were bewildered as to why they were forced to follow the Trump @POTUS account, and many accused Twitter of doing the new administration’s bidding.

Dorsey published his explanation, as a tweetstorm of course, on Saturday afternoon as the Women’s March, protesting the Trump administration, was underway in both Washington D.C. and satellite cities connected to the movement around the US.

In summary, Dorsey said that the issues effected more than half a million Twitter users and the company was making no excuses for its errors.

He explained that the White House, prior to former President Barack Obama’s departure, had worked on a social media transition plan that determined the “institutional” account of @POTUS on Twitter would be handed over with followers in tact. Twitter meant to have all followers of Barack Obama’s @POTUS account “migrated” to follow both @POTUS44, the 44th administration, and the Trump administration @POTUS.

However, Twitter bungled the handover. Some people who followed @POTUS44 after a certain time were auto-subscribed to @POTUS even if they explicitly had avoided the account earlier and did not want to see Trump’s tweets in their stream, for example.

You can read Dorsey’s apology in full here.

All: we investigated what happened here, and we made some mistakes (which have been corrected). Some context first. https://t.co/W1n3Xs6LaN

— jack (@jack) January 21, 2017