So, Twitter has long had two different classes of access: - "Twitter Developer" access - which is what you find here: https://dev.twitter.com/ https://dev.twi

So, Twitter has long had two different classes of access: - "Twitter Developer" access - which is what you find here: https://dev.twitter.com/ https://dev.twitter.com/ - that includes a streaming API that is relatively limited in terms of volume of data and operators that are allowed, but is free and open - Gnip Twitter access - this is commercial access that would include the Firehose option (though that's not very common). But basically this is a paid offering that offers much more functionality than the developer platform. In this specific case, the author is just losing elevated access to the streaming API: https://dev.twitter.com/streaming/reference/post/statuses/filter https://dev.twitter.com/streaming/reference/post/statuses/fi... I'm guessing they had extra keywords or multiple connections available so they could track those keywords. Nothing to do with the firehose or anything else. Just a user who had an exception to the official policy that's being taken away.