New York: The micro-blogging website Twitter permanently banned a sports journalist’s account on the grounds that he tweeted three GIFs (an image format) from the Rio Olympics Games on its platform.

Jim Weber, a contributing writer for Athlon Sports, explained in a LinkedIn post that he received emails from both Twitter and the International Olympics Committee (IOC) about his tweets but, despite trying to comply with it, he was banned, Tech Crunch reported on Friday.

“The organisations first demanded a removal of the content — the IOC gave a 10 minute window to do so — but within just a few minutes of Twitter’s first email, Weber’s account was temporarily suspended,” the report added.

Twitter later informed Weber that his account had been “permanently suspended for violating Twitter’s copyright policy.”

However, Weber’s account was restored following a huge public outcry.

Weber’s account has nearly 100,000 followers. He has sent more than 69,000 tweets to date and built a large following on Twitter.

The IOC regulations had banned GIFs, short video clips and live-streaming of sporting action during Rio Olympics.

“It’s disappointing that Twitter will throw users under the bus to do it by permanently banning the very users that built Twitter into the vibrant community it is today. It’s even more frustrating that I didn’t have a single human interaction but was delivered form letters determining my fate a” likely sent from somewhere halfway around the world,” Weber wrote on LinkedIn.

–IANS

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