Twitpic to shut down after falling foul of Twitter trademark
After five years of battling to trademark its name, Twitpic has decided to shut down after gaining the ire of Twitter's lawyers.
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Twitpic founder Noah Everett said in a blog post that the service will shut down on September 25, with users expected to be able to download their images and videos via a yet to be launched tool.
The decision comes after Twitter contacted Twitpic's legal team demanding that Twitpic abandon its application for a trademark, or it would see its API access cut off.
"Unfortunately we do not have the resources to fend off a large company like Twitter to maintain our mark which we believe whole heartedly is rightfully ours," Everett said. "Therefore, we have decided to shut down Twitpic."
"This is an unexpected and hard announcement for us to make."
The closure of Twitpic is unlikely to leave a vacuum in the already crowded third-party image-sharing space. Twitter has been offering its own photo capabilities to users since August 2011.
Last month a survey by the Queensland University of Technology uncovered that there were 2.8 million Australian Twitter accounts out of 750 million accounts globally at September 2013, and the service was adding 50,000 Australians a month.