February 8th, 2013 — Team Boid today is announcing a new step in the development of their Twitter client, Boid. Today, development of Boid for Twitter in its current form has been discontinued, but this is not the end and updates to the app will not stop; the project has reached the stage where it has accomplished its original goal of creating change in favour of better apps in the Android app market and it is felt that Boid is no longer needed to improve the state of the market, and can now move into its next stage of development. As highlighted in a previous (unofficial) statement, it is the opinion of the team that Boid was made to stir competition in the Play Store and to aid the Holo design pattern in gaining mass adoption by developers - a target which now appears to be met.
As of today, Boid will become an open-source project (OSP) as well as remaining a stand-alone app in the Play Store. Team Boid has decided to release source code and documentation to the Android community so that others can continue from where the team left off it that is what they wish to do. The team also firmly hopes that other new developers to the community will be able to learn from both Boid’s code and its design; the team is built up of teenagers who came to work together for this collective idea of a better Android. It was the first large-scale project most of the contributors had worked on, so to receive as much support and appreciation as they did was surprising: for this reason, the team hopes that other young developers, new to the world of Android, will be able to learn from Team Boid’s code and practices, and mistakes - simply managing to form the team was a task in itself.
An important note is that Boid is definitely not going away entirely; its code, and spirit, will live on through the community which will have every detail of the project freely available to edit, improve, develop and learn from. The lead developer of Boid, Aidan Follestad, has already produced a complete Git which includes more general details of how to integrate the Twitter API into any Android app; even your own Twitter client, and Boid's complete source code has also been made available.
More information about the Boid OSP and full source code can be found at boidapp.com/osp. More information about integrating the Twitter API into your Java application can be found at boidapp.com/api.
Thank you very much for your support of Boid over the past year - it has been a long journey and the landscape has changed massively since the project began. There are now many dedicated and skilled developers creating beautiful Holo apps for Android; and very soon, Team Boid will join them under a new name, with new members, and an all-new product to bring to the table and stir up the scene once again...
Do you have any questions? Feel free to contact us on Twitter @boidapp or by email: graham@boidapp.com.
Boid in the Press:
5 Lessons Learnt While Building Boid - @gmph, Medium
Alpha release of Boid for Android hits Google Play - Android Community
Boid gives Twitter an Android 4.0 bite of Ice Cream Sandwich - Androinica
Review: Boid Twitter client for Android - Android Central
Boid for Android could become the standard for Twitter clients - Phandroid
Boid Twitter client ends official development, goes open source - Android Authority
Team Boid lays out future plans for its Twitter client - Android Central
