The recent Elon Musk Twitter takeover has raised concerns about the future of the platform and the personal data Twitter collects in particular. If you are worried about the privacy and security of your personal data or even considering leaving Twitter, we are here to help! Let’s download your Twitter data and preserve it while you still can. Permanent.org will never surprise you with an acquisition, a bankruptcy, or a change in the terms of service that puts your cherished memories at risk.
Who are we? The world’s first and only consumer-grade cloud storage platform backed by a nonprofit organization. Permanent.org is a comprehensive digital preservation solution simple enough for anyone to use but powerful enough for professional archivists. Not only that, with Permanent.org there are no recurring fees. You only pay for the storage you need once and only when you need it. Not only that, but you get your first gigabyte on us.
Here’s the good news: a typical Twitter Archive is going to be less than a single gigabyte. So by creating an account on Permanent.org, you’ve just created a free and safe place to put your Twitter data. If you happen to be a minor internet celebrity and your archive is bigger than 1 GB then you’ll only be paying $10 for each additional gigabyte you need. That’s a one-time payment. As in $10 just this once. We’ll keep it stored indefinitely, allow you to access it any time you need, and never bill you again.
Don’t Wait to Download Your Twitter Archive
First, download an archive of your Twitter data and tweet history and back this up to a Permanent Archive. Twitter makes this easy for now, but don’t delay because we can’t know what is in store for the future. It already takes several hours or days for Twitter to prepare a ZIP file of your data for download. At this rate, who knows if this feature , or even Twitter as we know it still has several days left.
Once your Twitter archive is ready to download, you will receive a notification. Download the Twitter archive zip file to your desktop or laptop computer. Once it is done downloading (depending on the size of your archive, this may take several minutes) right click on the zip file to find a native OS option to expand it or use a zip extraction tool. You will see a “Your Archive.html” file you can open in your browser to inspect your archive. You can open this file in any web browser! Pretty nifty.
However, you should be aware of one important thing: the links in the “Your archive.html” page render as special “t.co” links. These use a special Twitter redirection service to work even if the links are not pointing to Twitter itself. This is something you can fix and you can even go as far as using the Internet Archive to create an archive of all the websites you’ve linked to from your tweets! Learn more in this thead:
Now You can upload the original zip file and/or the enclosed files and folders to your Permanent archive.
So, Why Can’t We Just Have Nice Things On the Internet?
We can and we do! It just requires careful consideration of our personal, sensitive data, which is an increasingly valuable and sought after commodity online. In the wrong hands, our data poses threats to our identities, allows us to be manipulated and exploited through marketing, and can be used to the advantage of others, without our knowledge or consent. The internet and social platforms we know and love are an ingrained part of everyday life for most, so these threats to personal data aren’t going away. We can have nice things but it requires some personal tech-hygiene practices, participating in the right tech communities and key commitments from tech companies.
First, whether you choose to keep or delete your account, there are many more steps you can take to restrict access to your personal information. Check out this excellent comprehensive guide for what you might consider doing to lock down your account or wipe the slate. If you are looking for other places as an alternative to Twitter, we recommend checking out Mastodon. It is a decentralized, open source, microblogging social media platform with intuitive web and mobile apps. Check out this helpful guide for tips on getting started.
Permanent.org exists for the preservation of your digital legacy, as you define it, not for profit. Whether you realize it or not, everything you do online is part of your digital legacy. Each tweet or photo uploaded has the potential to outlive you. One very important part of our mission is to help individuals take control of their digital legacy and leave behind what they wish. We do this through our cloud-based online archiving platform, where you have the ability to store any type of file or bit imaginable and organize them into meaningful collections. Our preservation and privacy-focused infrastructure ensures your digital assets are stored and shared on your terms, and your terms only, and prevents personal data mining or sensitive data exposure.
We will never commodify or exploit your digital assets for corporate or financial gain. Because we don’t have a third party advertising based business model, we will never sell, trade, or jeopardize your personal data and assets. We are proudly a not for profit organization using the same tried and true endowment model as museums, meaning we cannot be bought and sold, unlike a private or publicly traded company like Twitter. Additionally, our organization is guided by a world class advisory and governing board, who all help shape and support our work in data protections for our members.
We are mission-driven and accountable to our members, first and foremost. Much like the Internet Archive, Wikimedia, Mozilla Foundation, and other open web advocates, we are in favor of a healthy internet ecosystem and information marketplace, which requires consumer control of their data. Tech corporations and monolithic platforms that are privately owned are driven by profitability margins. That’s not us. We are open source we operate, develop new features, and grow our platform through transparency and dialogue with our member base. Our commitment to archival practices and long-term preservation provides the foundation for a trusted storage platform. Your financial support makes it possible to fulfill our mission and provide free cloud storage to small cultural heritage institutions, while also providing you with a safe, secure, private space for personal archiving.
