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In this era of “cancel culture” – in which any word, remark or observation on social media might land you in deep trouble with the social media thought police – it’s more important than ever before to know how to scrub the major social media platforms of any potentially offending content in advance. And that’s especially true on Twitter, where it’s so incredibly easy to leave a hasty, ill-advised remark or comment in 140 characters or less. The good news is that it’s still possible to delete your Twitter history before it’s too late and it won’t break the bank to do so.
Automatic deletion of your Twitter history
There are a number of popular web-based services – such as TweetDelete, Twit Wipe, Tweet Deleter and Tweet Eraser – that will delete your Twitter history for you. Some of these are free, while others require a subscription in order to continually auto-delete tweets from the past. The basic idea here is simple: for a minimal price (just a few bucks per month), these services will continually clean up your Twitter history, so that you don’t have to worry about some tweet from a few years ago all of a sudden causing a major ruckus online. The only downside of these services is that you can only delete 3,000 tweets at a time, so if you’ve been on Twitter for years and have a prolific history of sending out tweets at all times of the day and night, this process could take awhile.
Managing your Twitter data
That being said, it’s important to have a handle on what types of data Twitter is collecting about you, and how to manage it properly. Just because you delete your tweets doesn’t mean that they are gone forever. For example, say you want to delete your Twitter history, but still want to preserve all of your glorious tweets for posterity in some form. Well, Twitter allows you to download a .ZIP file of all your tweets that can be sent to the email address associated with your Twitter account. Just click on the “Your Twitter data” tab, and you’ll be guided through the process of downloading all your tweets in one simple, easy-to-read file.
The best time to wipe your Twitter history
So when is the best time to wipe your Twitter history? Some people prefer to do it on a rolling basis, which is why the subscription-based services like Tweet Eraser and Tweet Deleter are so popular. Set it and forget about it. You have options here to choose the age limits on your tweets. For example, you might choose to wipe tweets on a weekly basis or you might choose to wipe tweets on an annual basis. Think of it as preventative maintenance for your social media account. Just like it’s important to take your car in for routine maintenance work throughout the year, it’s also important to take your social media account in for routine maintenance work as well. In short, the best time to wipe your Twitter history is before it’s too late.
Final thought
Just keep in mind – nothing on the Internet is ever really “forgotten,” especially if you’re a top influencer or celebrity. How many times have you heard about people taking screenshots of tweets, just to have them available in case someone chooses to delete them later? So perhaps the best advice here is to be careful of what you post on Twitter, rather than tweeting out whatever you want and then counting on an online web service to clean up behind you.
