Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey has apologised to app developers who work with the social network to create apps, admitting that relationships had become “a little complicated” and in some cases, almost adversarial.

The statement came at Dorseys second public appearance since being named as Twitters permanent chief executive earlier this month, at the companys annual developer conference in San Francisco. Dorseys predecessor, Dick Costolo, is thought to have angered many developed when he introduced stricter rules around third-party apps during his tenure.

Dorsey is hoping to turn the social network around after its growth and revenues have faltered, and part of his strategy seems to be working more closely with developers using Twitters software tools.

“Our relationship with developers got confusing, unpredictable,” said Dorsey. “We want to come to you today and apologise for the confusion. We are going to reset our relations, and we want to make sure that we are learning, that we are listening and that we are rebooting”

Early in Twitters existence, third-party developers introduced fundamental features such as posting photos and shortening URLs before Twitter itself, but the company cracked down on apps in 2012 in order to prevent its UI becoming too muddled.

However, this move gave the firm a bad reputation among developers when consumer clients like Echofon, Tweetbot and others were heavily hit, and the companys somewhat draconian approach resurfaced earlier this year, when Politwoops, a service that highlighted tweets by politicians that had been deleted, was removed.

“We have a responsibility to continue to power organisations who want to bring transparency like Politwoops,” said Dorsey, keen to usher in a new era of co-operation between Twitter and the developer community.

At the event, two new software tools were unveiled by Chris Moody, vice president of data strategy at Twitter, which aim to provide developers and marketers with deeper insights into how audiences using the platform are responding to events, and how engaged they are.

Developers will also be giving tools to better identify who is using their apps, which Twitter has said will help programmers improve their products and their own marketing efforts.