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A calendar of upcoming changes to the Twitter Rules
- crystaln 9y agoIt will be interesting to see how Twitter allows Donald Trump to be abusive and threatening, while not allowing other celebrities, based on some carefully carved out definition of "newsworthy."
- pavel_lishin 9y agoWhat's the difference between "Better experience for Suspension Appeals" and "Educating abusers about our rules", and why does it have different dates? Both seem to address the problem of accounts being suspended, and not being told why. And will @USArmy be banned on November 3rd for being a "organization that uses violence to advance their cause"?
- jhugg 9y agoAll of these rules seem to make sense. They probably made sense 5 years ago? But seriously, why the grace period? If I condone violence to promote a cause in October, is that ok? Just not next month? Is revenge porn ok for another 6 days?
- zellyn 9y agoAny time you suspend people, you need an escalation path, and you need real support people behind that. So you can't just turn on all the things until you staff up.
- icebraining 9y agoThey could staff up before announcing the changes, though.
- adamrezich 9y agoHopefully Twitter actually defines a lot of these nebulous and highly-subjective terms going forward. What is the exact definition of a "violent group"? What constitutes "hateful imagery"? Where can I find their database of "hate symbols"? What constitutes a "hateful display name"? What constitutes "condoning and glorifying violence"? (I would argue that many if not most video games at least glorify violence, from my perspective!) In our modern Internet-connected society, the meanings of terms and symbols are subject to rapid and unexpected change. The ADL lists "Pepe the Frog" as a "hate symbol"[0], and while it's basically undeniable that many people use the symbol in an intentionally inflammatory or hateful context, I'm left completely at a loss as to whether or not posting an image of Pepe—or any cartoon frog for that matter—will get me suspended. (I have no reason to do so of course; this is entirely hypothetical.) From the perspective of many people, especially those who use Twitter, certain political figures are considered to be inherently "hateful", and showing support for them is considered to be an act of hate. There's a lot of talk about lines being drawn here but no talk of where exactly they will be drawn. [0] https://www.adl.org/education/references/hate-symbols/pepe-the-frog https://www.adl.org/education/references/hate-symbols/pepe-t...
- bitshiffed 9y agoGlorifying violence would also cover huge amounts of video media. I'm all for this, but I seriously doubt we'll see Twitter stand up to movie/television studios.
- zellyn 9y agoI think the big question here is our President's tweets…
- adamrezich 9y agoAnd the mass of replies that each of his tweets garners, most of which I would personally consider to be unilaterally "hateful", especially the ones that seem to always float to the top...
- dragonwriter 9y agoThey aren't affected by Twitter's existing rules, and presumably won't be by any new rules, unless they are changing not only the written rules but the unwritten rules controlling whether or not they apply the written rules.
- cisanti 9y agoWhat do you mean by that? Your president's idiotic tweets make Twitter millions, this is the only reason many people hear about Twitter...
- haydenlee 9y ago> Violent Groups. We will start suspending accounts for organizations that use violence to advance their cause. Surely this is just the spirit of the rule and not the literal definition? Or will all nation states be suspended from Twitter?
- ythn 9y agoAlso what if members of a group commit violent acts? Does that mean BLM and Antifa are out?
- eterm 9y agoRemember when twitter was praised for being part of what helped the Arab Spring? Now both corrupt and moral alike can be clamped down by these rules. Who will be the arbiter of what is considered a "violent organisation" and what is considered fair? Are "freedom fighters" on the side of good exempt from these suspensions or are twitter now simply too much part of the establishment to care for the next revolutions? I can understand that twitter absolutely need to clamp down on spread of hate-speech and the spread of horrendous videos such as those that were produced by ISIS/ISIL for propaganda and recruitment purposes. But vague rules leads to selective enforcement which could be worrying for free speech and democracy in future.
- Amezarak 9y ago> videos such as those that were produced by ISIS/ISIL ISIS videos are what people are using to sell these policies. In reality, a lot of mainstream political speech in the US and EU will be censored by these policies. This is not an accident. Social media has succeeded too well in allowing normal plebians to spread ideas the ruling classes find distasteful.
- jawns 9y agoOne of the things I think all social websites should take away from these rules is: Processes that requires making value judgements do not easily scale. There is so much in just this small list of changes that really cannot be automated or done without some kind of human interaction.
- drunken-serval 9y agoAnyone that runs a social website either already knows this or learns the hard way. The real issue is few people who use social website understand how difficult a problem this is.
- s73ver_ 9y agoOne of the reasons why these problems got so big is that these companies tried to automate too much of it. Had they started with people moderating from the start, the kinds of problems they had likely wouldn't have taken hold in the first place.
- BurningFrog 9y agoBut with people moderating, you can never have billions of users.
- rsoto 9y agoOne thing that bothers me about twitter is that there is a special case of harassement that is just impossible to report: trending topics. Here in Mexico (can't say if that happens anywhere else), every week or two there are hate trending topics against women, other countries and indigenous people and these last for more than a day. If twitter wants to be a «safe and welcoming place» for anybody, they are missing out a huge issue, as there is no way to report a trending topic nor to find who created/popularized it in the first place (so we can report it, altough I'm sure it wouldn't lead to anything). I can't imagine what's going on twitter directive's heads, as the trending topic is almost one of the top 5 things a new user sees. For what I can tell, these trending topics are created by influencers and bots to flex their muscles before a paid campaign, often regarding the government.
- jordigh 9y agoI haven't followed Mexican Twitter much, so I'm a little surprised but not too much to hear that there are anti-women trending topics with regularity. Do you think this is a general Mexican machismo cultural problem or something that is more localised to the internet?
- rsoto 9y agoCan't say for sure, but we mexicans are very hypocrite about racism. We look at the US and can't believe how they treat their immigrants, but we do the same in the south border. I have heard that we treat them even worse than what happens in our north border. There's a machismo culture and it might be the worst about ourselves, but also we look down to the indigenous population, saying things like «you are so indigenous» to mock somebody who has done something stupid. Obviously we are not all like that, but when you look at the average mexican, things are not looking too good. So there's that, but also the thing about the trending topics is that it looks like it's created by people that gets paid to create them. And between jobs they are testing their weapons, focusing on a controversial issue (when you click on a trending topic it's almost 50%-50% people using it to make their hateful statement to those who use it to defend the affected group of people). Regardless, a platform as interested in their user's safety shouldn't be a megaphone for hate speech.
- kevinmchugh 9y agoThese are all just more detail on the One Rule of Social Media: You get banned when you're more trouble than you're worth. There's some obviously good refinements here, suspension appeals are a no-brainer. There's been an undocumented appeals process where banned users complain until some twitter employee cares enough to look into it, but many users don't have enough clout to have that accomplished. No added rules are going to protect users who write in languages which Twitter doesn't employee readers of: https://theconcourse.deadspin.com/your-app-isnt-helping-the-people-of-saudi-arabia-1790198445 https://theconcourse.deadspin.com/your-app-isnt-helping-the-...
- brianberns 9y ago> No added rules are going to protect users who write in languages which Twitter doesn't employee readers of How would a user who writes in such a language get banned in the first place?
- viraptor 9y ago(photo of a person being shot) "this is what just happened on the street!" Banned: you're propagating violence, I'm assuming that from the photo (Photo of a racist poster) "look at what company X uses to get more money" Banned: spreading racist images
- anonnyj 9y agoUnfortunate coincidences where a word or phrase in an unsupported language looks like something offensive in a supportrd language.
- StreamBright 9y agoI doubt that Milo's ban was worth it in the financial sense.
- eqmvii 9y agoHopefully those nitpicking the wording, timing, and implementation of these rules realize just how deep harassment and hate run on social media platforms like Twitter. Certainly the rules are imperfect, but the amount of anonymous toxicity currently allowed is IMO much worse than some clunky standards. There's a lot of space between defending free speech and standing idly by while people use your service to attack others.
- KGIII 9y agoI don't think Twitter is actually interested in defending free speech? Free speech is defending the toxic speech. Acceptable speech needs no defense.
- s73ver_ 9y agoThen count me out. I have no interest whatsoever in defending racial slurs or rape threats.
- nate_meurer 9y agoThat's understandable. However, while threats of violence are not protected speech in the U.S., insults (e.g., racial slurs) absolutely are, and that protection is the reason you can't be punished for insulting cops, for example, or whatever else might hurt someone's feelings.
- pjc50 9y agoTwitter is not just in the US, though.
- KGIII 9y agoThats okay. You're just not a proponent of free speech. Free speech is the deplorable and socially unacceptable. It was once unacceptable to suggest black people had rights or that women should vote. To think we are at the apex of morality is hubris. Thus, I feel freedom of expression remains a vital component in modernity.
- ThrustVectoring 9y agoI'd be shocked if these rules get used on the "let's punch Nazis" camp. More likely is that there's now additional things to point to when "problematic" tweets get mass-flagged.
- KGIII 9y agoRecently, someone posted a complaint about a Halloween costume that was a wall. That got the perpetually outraged group in motion, of course. One user said she would punch anyone who she saw wearing such a costume. Twitter banned her. So, things may be changing slowly. It isn't easy for some folks to see faults in people who agree with them. I notice that when I stand up for something on the political right, I'm often assumed to be a member of the right. If I point out a problem with the political left, I'm often assumed to be a member of the political right. It's very binary and people really aren't always objective. But, there are instances where this is changing. Some BLM members were recently banned because of hate speech and suggesting violence and some AntiFa have also suffered the same fate. It takes time but it does appear that they are being more honest with their enforcement. Of course, you still have the group who will try to interpret things as other than written. There are people who see -isms where none exist. On this topic, it has led me to trying to coin the phrase, 'If you seek umbrage, you will find it.' I've seen another person quote it, so it may be catching on slowly.
- kelukelugames 9y agoRose Mcgowan was temporarily suspended too.
- notatoad 9y agoshe posted somebody's phone number. If there's one surefire way to get punished on twitter, that's it.
- rdtsc 9y ago> I notice that when I stand up for something on the political right, I'm often assumed to be a member of the right. I was downright called a "Russian shill" just a few weeks ago. I criticized something Clinton did or said something about "the Russians" campaign. They proceeded to go and dig though my post history and found something 300 some days ago about how I speak Russian, so that was their proof that Putin is sending me a check every month. There is a definite feel lately of "If you criticize my party, then you clearly must be a member of the other party, probably from the most extremist sub-group of it."
- kelukelugames 9y agoI've seen a lot of anti-semitic and Right Wind Death Squad (RWDS) memes on Twitter. How can the company be anti harassment when that is allowed?
- ProAm 9y agoNot being political but I honestly feel Donald Trump saved Twitter from oblivion. They were in dire straits last year and seem to have coasted through. I still sort of wish they would fail and vanish, but I think it's significant they are still here today when they couldn't find a buyer to save their lives not long ago.
- dannyr 9y agoTrump may have brought in new users but Twitter definitely lost users who just can't deal with Trump and his followers.
- rhizome 9y agoWhere are you guys getting this idea? https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15519111 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15519111
- MBCook 9y agoIt certainly gets their name out there a lot more. The truth is journalists really seem to love Twitter so I don’t think it was going to go anywhere anytime soon anyway.
- deleted 9y ago[deleted]
- dogruck 9y agoI think a big step forward would be a "right to be forgotten." Currently, the Twitter hoard is free to dox, "parody" and generally permanently harass any private citizen. Anyone who has attempted to use Twitter's reporting mechanism knows it's a vapid black hole to /dev/null. I've been told, "oh, people who hire a lawyer can usually get traction" -- and that's ridiculous.
- rtpg 9y agoFor the reporting mechanism: it isn't! I've reported many people's tweets. Mainly people posting far-right memes and also yelling at people for being Jews. Their accounts go away after a couple of days. This might not be as effective for less blatant rule breaking
- dogruck 9y agoInteresting. I have a few reactions to that: * still bad that it took days given the exponential decay of social media impact * as you point out, that's some low hanging fruit. For example, they explicitly permit parody accounts of any person * I'm curious if they respond equally to far-left memes
- MBCook 9y agoI don’t know about far left stuff but I’ve certainly seen a TON of complaints from women being harassed or targeted or out right under siege by hordes of users piling on them and complained that Twitter doesn’t do anything about it or even remove the reported tweets. My experience was joining Twitter and then within a month or two scene the attacks that started gamer gate. Things don’t seem to have improved since then even though they keep saying they’ll fix some of this stuff. I’ll believe it when I see it because so far they’ve never managed to do anything reasonable, at least in a sane timeframe.
- dogruck 9y agoYes, I know two women who were explicitly doxed. Their cell phones started ringing incessantly. People posted and retweeted snapshots of their tweets. Oh -- one woman is transgender and she was "outed" as a "man." Twitter did nothing.
- perlgeek 9y agoNo words on actions against bots. I guess technically they are already forbidden, so not applicable in a "rules" post, but still a bit disappointing.
- MBCook 9y agoI agree. The few times I’ve ever tried to look at my “local“ Twitter have been a mess. Bot posting weather for where I live (and a whole bunch of other places?). Flood of postings of every job entered to any online database near me. A whole bunch of other automated garbage. If I want to see what people near me are tweeting it’s basically impossible. The signal to noise ratio is insane.
- PatientTrades 9y agoWithout President Trump twitter would be useless in all honestly. It was slowly dying similar to tumblr, myspace, etc. But Trump revitalized it and made it a staple of politics. Great way to bypass the media and talk directly to the people
- DavidSJ 9y agoAnd with him it's worse than useless.
- ThreePostWonder 9y agoAnd when the bans happen, the Butterfly War will be ready and waiting to completely hijack their policy and AI until they target the very people they seek to protect. http://www.cultstate.com/2017/10/13/The-Butterfly-War/ http://www.cultstate.com/2017/10/13/The-Butterfly-War/
- YouAreGreat 9y agoInteresting. Scary to see how believable this assertion has become by now: Google is deploying military-tested techniques and methodologies against American citizens
- gnicholas 9y agoKind of weird to share these guidelines as an image of text. It's not accessible this way, and I can't think of any reason why they would have chosen to share it as an image instead of a table with text. What am I missing?
- ClassyJacket 9y agoI would assume so it can be tweeted. That's Twitter for you. Under 140 at all costs, even if it screws the vision impaired.
- gnicholas 9y agoWell yeah they could tweet an image of text if they want (and use alt-text if they cared), but why would they handicap the website by using the same image?
- deleted 9y ago[deleted]
- coliveira 9y agoThis article makes a clear case why we should NOT be using Twitter. This means that in a supposedly open society and with a supposedly open technology there will be a company patrolling what each of us say, to see if it corresponds to what THEY believe to be appropriate? You can please count me out.
- coliveira 9y agoAnd of course they would be using this only against people that have no economic or political power. Otherwise they would have banned the big liar and instigator that sits in the WH.
- jacobr 9y agoOrganisations that use violence to advance their cause would include any army and armed forces, sometimes even posting images of things like drone strikes. I doubt they would be banned though, it would make it very difficult to keep up to date with international conflicts such as the ones in Syria and Yemen.
- sjreese 9y agoLevel Set: Amendment 1 Freedom of Religion, Speech, and the Press Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion or prohibiting the free exercise thereof, or abridging the freedom of speech or of the press, or the right of the people peaceably to assemble aAmendment 1 Freedom of Religion, Speech, and the Press Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion or prohibiting the free exercise thereof, or abridging the freedom of speech or of the press, or the right of the people peaceably to assemble and to petition the government for a redress of grievances. And to petition the government for a redress of grievances.
- Marazan 9y agoCool, how does that apply to Twitter?
- followmeon 9y agoOne man's hate symbol is another man's freedom of expression. https://www.adl.org/education/references/hate-symbols/pepe-the-frog https://www.adl.org/education/references/hate-symbols/pepe-t... If Twitter really bans Pepe the Frog I expect a huge backlash. Whatever mechanism exists to get some symbol recognized as a hate symbol will be exploited by trolls: The Twitter bird itself could be saying some very nasty stuff soon. Unwanted sexual advances is also a slippery slope. Twitter is already banning/muting users that make sexual advances to a company mascotte: Tony the Tiger. So I can't imagine how this will look like in "real life". About the hateful names, what exactly would this be targeting? Are "jewgoldstein" or "(((they)))know" hateful ban-able names? I don't have a verified logo next to my name, nor can I write 280 character Tweets, so I don't have much to lose if these new rules turn out to be draconic. All the hate groups (think lowest of low: harassing family of suicide victims), all the violence, all the glorification of terrorist attacks: It is mostly water under the bridge by now, and posturing. The large number of bots and users guarantees that this will be some ML algorithm with a few false positives, that won't have much of a voice for you to care about it.
- thinkingemote 9y agoI think that this really does teach something valuable about social media and what humans actually are. I think we are seeing the death of Social Media here, at least in its current shape. One hopes that some technologist will learn some lessons from this and build something better. Of course, I'm just a youngster and some of you oldies would just be seeing history repeated, I guess, but what I have in mind is the truly global nature of societies and peoples.