Twitter has updated its terms of service to allow the possible introduction of advertising to the microblogging site.
In a company blog post, Twitter said the modified terms would “leave the door open to advertising.”
The revised ToS states that Twitter may choose to introduce services such as advertising without providing the user with prior notice. Twitter has also reserved the right to further change the terms in the future.
The company has long said it is reluctant to resort to traditional banner advertising, but that it is exploring more innovative advertising methods.
“Do we hate advertising? Of course not,” the company said in May. “It's a huge industry filled with creativity and inspiration. There's also room for new innovation in advertising, marketing, and public relations and Twitter is already part of that.”
Twitter has also developed draft API guidelines, which will require developers of third-party Twitter apps to agree not to edit tweets - except to overcome technical limitations - and to get users' permission before rebroadcasting or reusing their messages.
“Twitter is allowed to use, copy [and] distribute your tweets because that's what we do. However, they are your tweets and they belong to you,” the company said.
Twitter has been growing exponentially since it launched two years ago. The site attracted 44.5 million unique users in June alone – a 15-fold increase from June 2008 – according to ComScore. But the company has yet to find a business model.