5 ms·

That is not what I think is the issue. The issue is that Twitter is behaving like an editorial. What Twitter did is effectively singling out a politician for hi

That is not what I think is the issue. The issue is that Twitter is behaving like an editorial. What Twitter did is effectively singling out a politician for his views without any regard for being unbiased (which is what a platform should be). I don't see Twitter attaching disclaimers to the tweets issued by any other politician or World leader. I can give multiple instances of politicians in my country misusing Twitter to spread propaganda and outright lies. If Twitter wanted to rebut Trump it could have done it by commenting under the Tweet just like everyone else. The moment Twitter assumes an editorial role upon itself it is no longer a platform but a publisher. > The gameplan might be to build a direct connection between the vast financial resources of the republican party and their ability to influence online audiences Assuming that there is some "game-plan" is far fetched. If Twitter hadn't done this there wouldn't be a hue and cry in the first place. No one asked Twitter to attach its own opinion to the tweet. It did it on its own volition. The fact is that Twitter is heavily tilted towards the left. Jack Dorsey is himself a self-declared left-leaning liberal. India has had its fair share of random banning of right-leaning accounts with those accounts not violating any Twitter policy. After hue and cry those accounts are reinstated. Once reinstated, there is no explanation given as to why the account was banned in the first place and why the account was reinstated. And it has happened multiple times! If you are going to preach about democracy and fair play then first start at home. Else it will just reek of hypocrisy. And people hate hypocrisy more than lies. At least you know when someone is lying. But you never know when someone is being a hypocrite until you dig his/her past!

loopz 6y ago
Instead of digging into the distant past and guessing intentions, one can just fact-check them and make informed decisions at elections based on facts, not self-serving unsubstantiated claims. One needs to use a first filter first.
- shripadk 6y ago
  But how is Twitter qualified as a fact checker/arbiter? Twitter just cannot assume that role onto itself unless it is specifically chosen to be one and has reported itself as one to the relevant authorities. And once it does that, it binds itself to the regulations that govern an arbiter. Will Twitter subject itself to such regulations? And who decides whether the citations are factual? Does Twitter decide it? If Twitter decides it then isn't it behaving like a Quasi-Judicial body? If it is like one then it is no longer a platform. You cannot call yourself a "platform" and then suddenly decide to change the character of your business and behave like an arbiter. There is a reason why you mention your nature of business while setting up your company. That way the authorities know what regulations will apply to you. If Twitter is behaving like a publisher and the publishing regulations do not apply then you are creating a monster in the process! And for what justification? Just to take on a politician whose term is fixed? Twitter is going to exist even when Trump isn't the President. By allowing Twitter to get away with this you are going to be setting a precedent for other companies to behave in a similar fashion. Then what is the point of rules and regulations? No one will follow it. Every company will decide to modify its nature of business as it sees fit.
  - loopz 6y ago
    Fair question in isolation. However, are providing fact-checking links really being an arbiter when it's just a link to fact-checking sources? You could criticise those sources as biased, but as fact-checking, one would also need to find flaws in the facts-check itself for it to be anything substantial, and not just FUD-raising. The extra notices could also have been separate posts by Twitter, or any other method/design of informing users. Twitter is mandated to inform or remove possible factual errors in their platform, in order to combat fake news and undue external political influence. There is no right for anybody to tell blatant lies and to suppress fact-checks as protected by free speech laws. Some of it are not lies and not that exhaggerated, so it's hard to draw solid lines in the sand. Fact-checking seems a reasonable alternative. Mitigations have already been mandated after last election to combat fake news. Twitter being the owner of both platform and expression of content, is the final decisionmaker of their own social media platform, unless violating Constitution, regulation or laws. This expression is probably mostly covered by 1st Amendment and property laws.
    - shripadk 6y ago
      > However, are providing fact-checking links really being an arbiter when it's just a link to fact-checking sources? Everything drastic starts off with a minor tweak. A minor change. These minor changes in a business' character add up to create a monster in the end. And we all know how companies keep changing policies that give them more and more control. We want the exact opposite. These are platforms for a reason. That is the beauty of it. If you want to tamper with people's opinions then you are no longer a platform. You are an editorial. You just cannot use a space you have given to someone to add your own views. There is no two ways about it. Even if they are a private company, they have a public platform that is used by everyone. And with that kind of power comes greater responsibility. Whether Trump lies or not, the mandate for electing an alternative is always with the People of the United States. But you have no alternative to Twitter when it comes to ease of instant communication with millions of followers. What Twitter has done has a chilling effect. Adding notices now depends on some employee inside Twitter. Today it is Trump, tomorrow it can be someone else. It all depends on that employee's mood/feeling/bias. And as far as fact-checking is concerned we know how easy it is to "manufacture facts". Manufactured facts were used for waging Wars. Some of them on fellow humans. Some others on drugs like Marijuana. And those manufactured facts were never cross checked. Some others are even worse. Let us take WHO for instance. What do you say for this: https://twitter.com/WHO/status/1217043229427761152 https://twitter.com/WHO/status/1217043229427761152 "Preliminary investigations conducted by the Chinese authorities have found no clear evidence of human-to-human transmission of the novel #coronavirus (2019-nCoV) identified in #Wuhan, #China" We all knew there was clear evidence of human-to-human transmission because of the lockdown imposed in Wuhan, the number of people falling sick and the rapid construction of hospitals by the Chinese Government. Yet WHO chose to lie. Did Twitter try to fact check this? This tweet is still on the platform. We all know now that it was a lie from the start. This lie put millions to suffer and killed hundreds of thousands of people around the World. Yet Twitter isn't doing anything. Not even attaching a "Fact Check" against that monstrous lie. > Twitter is mandated to inform or remove possible factual errors in their platform, in order to combat fake news and undue external political influence. > Mitigations have already been mandated after last election to combat fake news. Who mandated Twitter to take on this role? The US Government? I haven't come across any law that mandates social media companies to combat fake news/undue external political influence. If you have any reference I would be happy to read more about it.

loopz 6y ago

Instead of digging into the distant past and guessing intentions, one can just fact-check them and make informed decisions at elections based on facts, not self-serving unsubstantiated claims. One needs to use a first filter first.

shripadk 6y ago
But how is Twitter qualified as a fact checker/arbiter? Twitter just cannot assume that role onto itself unless it is specifically chosen to be one and has reported itself as one to the relevant authorities. And once it does that, it binds itself to the regulations that govern an arbiter. Will Twitter subject itself to such regulations? And who decides whether the citations are factual? Does Twitter decide it? If Twitter decides it then isn't it behaving like a Quasi-Judicial body? If it is like one then it is no longer a platform. You cannot call yourself a "platform" and then suddenly decide to change the character of your business and behave like an arbiter. There is a reason why you mention your nature of business while setting up your company. That way the authorities know what regulations will apply to you. If Twitter is behaving like a publisher and the publishing regulations do not apply then you are creating a monster in the process! And for what justification? Just to take on a politician whose term is fixed? Twitter is going to exist even when Trump isn't the President. By allowing Twitter to get away with this you are going to be setting a precedent for other companies to behave in a similar fashion. Then what is the point of rules and regulations? No one will follow it. Every company will decide to modify its nature of business as it sees fit.
- loopz 6y ago
  Fair question in isolation. However, are providing fact-checking links really being an arbiter when it's just a link to fact-checking sources? You could criticise those sources as biased, but as fact-checking, one would also need to find flaws in the facts-check itself for it to be anything substantial, and not just FUD-raising. The extra notices could also have been separate posts by Twitter, or any other method/design of informing users. Twitter is mandated to inform or remove possible factual errors in their platform, in order to combat fake news and undue external political influence. There is no right for anybody to tell blatant lies and to suppress fact-checks as protected by free speech laws. Some of it are not lies and not that exhaggerated, so it's hard to draw solid lines in the sand. Fact-checking seems a reasonable alternative. Mitigations have already been mandated after last election to combat fake news. Twitter being the owner of both platform and expression of content, is the final decisionmaker of their own social media platform, unless violating Constitution, regulation or laws. This expression is probably mostly covered by 1st Amendment and property laws.
  - shripadk 6y ago
    > However, are providing fact-checking links really being an arbiter when it's just a link to fact-checking sources? Everything drastic starts off with a minor tweak. A minor change. These minor changes in a business' character add up to create a monster in the end. And we all know how companies keep changing policies that give them more and more control. We want the exact opposite. These are platforms for a reason. That is the beauty of it. If you want to tamper with people's opinions then you are no longer a platform. You are an editorial. You just cannot use a space you have given to someone to add your own views. There is no two ways about it. Even if they are a private company, they have a public platform that is used by everyone. And with that kind of power comes greater responsibility. Whether Trump lies or not, the mandate for electing an alternative is always with the People of the United States. But you have no alternative to Twitter when it comes to ease of instant communication with millions of followers. What Twitter has done has a chilling effect. Adding notices now depends on some employee inside Twitter. Today it is Trump, tomorrow it can be someone else. It all depends on that employee's mood/feeling/bias. And as far as fact-checking is concerned we know how easy it is to "manufacture facts". Manufactured facts were used for waging Wars. Some of them on fellow humans. Some others on drugs like Marijuana. And those manufactured facts were never cross checked. Some others are even worse. Let us take WHO for instance. What do you say for this: https://twitter.com/WHO/status/1217043229427761152 https://twitter.com/WHO/status/1217043229427761152 "Preliminary investigations conducted by the Chinese authorities have found no clear evidence of human-to-human transmission of the novel #coronavirus (2019-nCoV) identified in #Wuhan, #China" We all knew there was clear evidence of human-to-human transmission because of the lockdown imposed in Wuhan, the number of people falling sick and the rapid construction of hospitals by the Chinese Government. Yet WHO chose to lie. Did Twitter try to fact check this? This tweet is still on the platform. We all know now that it was a lie from the start. This lie put millions to suffer and killed hundreds of thousands of people around the World. Yet Twitter isn't doing anything. Not even attaching a "Fact Check" against that monstrous lie. > Twitter is mandated to inform or remove possible factual errors in their platform, in order to combat fake news and undue external political influence. > Mitigations have already been mandated after last election to combat fake news. Who mandated Twitter to take on this role? The US Government? I haven't come across any law that mandates social media companies to combat fake news/undue external political influence. If you have any reference I would be happy to read more about it.