I love that someone did this. Twitter is crazy if they think anyone without API access and a financial stake is actually going to bother to listen to their brand guidelines.
One of the things that made Twitter a great brand is that end users got to kind of invent a little bit of the brand whenever they promoted their Twitter accounts on their sites and other places. It encouraged creativity that eventually extended to what the users posted on the service.
Why bow to the gods of uniformity after half a decade of freedom? With the reach of their network and the level of influence they've built, don't they have something better to spend their time on?
I don't think they really expect everyone to listen to their guidelines. However, in order to maintain their trademark, I believe they have to defend it actively. I think this page is more a way to appease the lawyers than anything else.
Of course, I know literally nothing about the laws in question and could be off base entirely.
I'm pretty sure that these guidelines are exactly about protecting against dilution. I think the logic is as follows--the actual Twitter logo (and, consequently, trademark) is not just a bird, it's that specific bird, in that orientation and that color. Allowing anybody to do anything with it would dilute it. And so they must protect against this.
For what it's worth, I've certainly seen documents like this from other companies. Based on these observations (rather than the actual law :/), I think that what they're doing is part of protecting it from dilution.
One of the things that made Twitter a great brand is that end users got to kind of invent a little bit of the brand whenever they promoted their Twitter accounts on their sites and other places. It encouraged creativity that eventually extended to what the users posted on the service.
Why bow to the gods of uniformity after half a decade of freedom? With the reach of their network and the level of influence they've built, don't they have something better to spend their time on?