8 ms·

> they are looking only at tweets/comments, not the people being followed Journalists have already been called out for this, so it's likely not a useful metric

> they are looking only at tweets/comments, not the people being followed Journalists have already been called out for this, so it's likely not a useful metric any more. The accounts they choose to follow are likely carefully calculated since they're aware it's visible and people look at these things. Anyone can have multiple Twitter accounts, so it'd be trivial to have another account that follows a different set of accounts that one scrolls through normally.

ketzo 6y ago
To state the obvious, it’s also very easy to follow someone and just mute them so you don’t actually see their content in your feed.
- secondcoming 6y ago
  Yes, but people will look at who you follow on twitter to see if you're a white supremacist or not.
  - ColanR 6y ago
    It's unfortunate, but I don't think you're wrong.
  - war1025 6y ago
    I don't actually follow anyone on twitter. I just got to three or four specific pages to see what content they've posted. Usually they share an interesting selection of tweets, which gets me exposure to more than just those specific people. I don't really understand what the purpose of following someone is
    - bootcampwhere 6y ago
      I don't really understand what the purpose of following someone is, But you can use the internet?
    - chc 6y ago
      What you're describing just sounds like a more labor-intensive method of following those people. The purpose of following people is so you can see that same content aggregated into a feed.
      - war1025 6y ago
        Is twitter an actual linear timeline? I assumed it was the same as a Facebook feed where it's just a random smattering of who knows what.
        chc 6y ago
        It has both modes. At the top of your feed, there's an icon that looks like three sparkles. If you click it, you can set your feed to "Home" (the Facebook-ish option where an algorithm creates your feed) or "Latest Tweets" (the linear timeline).
  - catacombs 6y ago
    Has this happened to you?
  - shuntress 6y ago
    Are you suggesting that journalists should follow white supremacists as part of their general truth-seeking without people assuming they endorse the white supremacist's message? Or are you suggesting that white supremacists should not be shunned as a matter of course in normal interaction/conversation?
    - deleted 6y ago
      [deleted]
    - minimuffins 6y ago
      Yes, journalists should absolutely follow white supremacists and tell me what they're up to so I don't have to. That is their job.
    - whywhywhywhy 6y ago
      I don't think anyone is suggesting journalists should go to a white supremacists house for dinner and pet their dog. But if journalists are going to insist that Twitter is the place where their job happens then they should be following all the sources they need to deliver the news accurately on that service. We're not the ones telling them that Twitter is the real world and not just another internet forum, they're the ones telling us that, they're the ones who hold value in that service because it serves to elevate them, not us. If a journalist isn't following an individual because they're worried the follower count gives that individual value then I'd say that's a much bigger concern that the journalist holds so much value in follower count on an internet forum. Probably time for them to put the phone down and talk to some real people outside their apartment.
      - shuntress 6y ago
        It seems a bit rash to take as a given that journalists "insist that Twitter is the place where their job happens" while at the same time rejecting the common assumption that follower count is generally a proxy for importance. As far as I am aware, it is easy to read anyone's public statements on Twitter without following them and private messages are obviously inherently private. It seems fairly reasonable for journalists to conduct their work in that public forum without without tacitly endorsing white supremacy. With that said, I am not really sure what your point is. Could you please clarify?
bachmeier 6y ago
If you use Tweetdeck, following means literally nothing (in literal's traditional sense). Everything is based on lists, which are unrelated to follows.
danso 6y ago
> The accounts they choose to follow are likely carefully calculated since they're aware it's visible and people look at these things. Aren't the replies and retweets they make also carefully calculated?
- moduspol 6y ago
  Sure, but it’s a lot easier to make a list of accounts to follow that suggests you’re impartial or well-rounded. It’s a lot tougher to spend every day ensuring your replies and retweets do the same.
  - danso 6y ago
    I'm a pretty big user of Twitter, including in the capacity of a journalist. But I'm highly skeptical of this reasoning. When I look at the Twitter profile of any given mainstream (e.g. ostensibly left-leaning) journalist, I'll find that I have dozens if not hundreds of mutual followers (e.g. "Followers you know"). If I look at the profile of an ostensibly right-leaning journalists (e.g. a Daily Caller reporter), the number of mutual followers is inevitably fewer [0]. I think you misestimate a few variables. For starters, journalists and most mainstream Twitter users are not inclined to doing gruntwork, such as curating a list of people to follow and then mute. Similarly, the use of Twitter lists, which also involves the manual gruntwork of curation, is very rare among the many personal accounts I follow. For 99% of everyday use (i.e. not specifically investigating someone's social media activity), journalists and mainstream users also lack the interest in analyzing a given user's followings list. Occasionally I see people mention FollowersAudit/BotOrNot. Can't remember the last time I've seen someone mention a purported political audit tool. In fact, I can't remember the last time I've seen someone mention tools like https://doesfollow.com/ https://doesfollow.com/. You also underestimate the perceived value of following-to-followers ratio. Almost all of the big name Twitter accounts (again, not just journalists) follow a relative handful of accounts versus followers count. It's widely perceived that a small accounts-followed number is a signal of prestige, or at least self-importance. Thus, an even lower incentive to pad that number in hopes of boosting a hard-to-perceive impartiality metric. Anyway, the proof should be in the pudding. Are there any notable accounts that obviously stuff their followings with people they politically dislike/hate, for the purpose of pretending to be non-partisan? Shouldn't we see this in the brand accounts, like @nytimes [1], which have a desire to be seen as fair and also have no obligation/expectation to actually engage via retweet/reply? [0] In this case, I don't think the reason is primarily caused by ideology; the number of right-leaning news outlets are far and few between, which reduces the potential of direct personal/professional ties. I find that the few former DCaller reporters who have moved to larger outlets and who I follow do not have a disparity in mutuals) [1] Here's a CSV dump of @nytimes ~900 followed accounts, which are almost all NYT employees: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1sW_ZmgONfsAIy1IKsETJJA9RaCuGQEXSwFCfvzjiIAA/edit#gid=0 https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1sW_ZmgONfsAIy1IKsETJ...
jb775 6y ago
> Journalists have already been called out for this This makes it even worse. They were called out for living in an echo chamber and refused to acknowledge or fix it. > Anyone can have multiple Twitter accounts This is a generous assumption. Considering we're here talking about cold hard facts scraped from Twitter, a blanket assumption like this to disregard everything found is poor form. You sound like a journalist.
- deleted 6y ago
  [deleted]

ketzo 6y ago

To state the obvious, it’s also very easy to follow someone and just mute them so you don’t actually see their content in your feed.

secondcoming 6y ago
Yes, but people will look at who you follow on twitter to see if you're a white supremacist or not.
- ColanR 6y ago
  It's unfortunate, but I don't think you're wrong.
- war1025 6y ago
  I don't actually follow anyone on twitter. I just got to three or four specific pages to see what content they've posted. Usually they share an interesting selection of tweets, which gets me exposure to more than just those specific people. I don't really understand what the purpose of following someone is
  - bootcampwhere 6y ago
    I don't really understand what the purpose of following someone is, But you can use the internet?
  - chc 6y ago
    What you're describing just sounds like a more labor-intensive method of following those people. The purpose of following people is so you can see that same content aggregated into a feed.
    - war1025 6y ago
      Is twitter an actual linear timeline? I assumed it was the same as a Facebook feed where it's just a random smattering of who knows what.
      - chc 6y ago
        It has both modes. At the top of your feed, there's an icon that looks like three sparkles. If you click it, you can set your feed to "Home" (the Facebook-ish option where an algorithm creates your feed) or "Latest Tweets" (the linear timeline).
- catacombs 6y ago
  Has this happened to you?
- shuntress 6y ago
  Are you suggesting that journalists should follow white supremacists as part of their general truth-seeking without people assuming they endorse the white supremacist's message? Or are you suggesting that white supremacists should not be shunned as a matter of course in normal interaction/conversation?
  - deleted 6y ago
    [deleted]
  - minimuffins 6y ago
    Yes, journalists should absolutely follow white supremacists and tell me what they're up to so I don't have to. That is their job.
  - whywhywhywhy 6y ago
    I don't think anyone is suggesting journalists should go to a white supremacists house for dinner and pet their dog. But if journalists are going to insist that Twitter is the place where their job happens then they should be following all the sources they need to deliver the news accurately on that service. We're not the ones telling them that Twitter is the real world and not just another internet forum, they're the ones telling us that, they're the ones who hold value in that service because it serves to elevate them, not us. If a journalist isn't following an individual because they're worried the follower count gives that individual value then I'd say that's a much bigger concern that the journalist holds so much value in follower count on an internet forum. Probably time for them to put the phone down and talk to some real people outside their apartment.
    - shuntress 6y ago
      It seems a bit rash to take as a given that journalists "insist that Twitter is the place where their job happens" while at the same time rejecting the common assumption that follower count is generally a proxy for importance. As far as I am aware, it is easy to read anyone's public statements on Twitter without following them and private messages are obviously inherently private. It seems fairly reasonable for journalists to conduct their work in that public forum without without tacitly endorsing white supremacy. With that said, I am not really sure what your point is. Could you please clarify?

bachmeier 6y ago

If you use Tweetdeck, following means literally nothing (in literal's traditional sense). Everything is based on lists, which are unrelated to follows.

danso 6y ago

> The accounts they choose to follow are likely carefully calculated since they're aware it's visible and people look at these things. Aren't the replies and retweets they make also carefully calculated?

moduspol 6y ago
Sure, but it’s a lot easier to make a list of accounts to follow that suggests you’re impartial or well-rounded. It’s a lot tougher to spend every day ensuring your replies and retweets do the same.
- danso 6y ago
  I'm a pretty big user of Twitter, including in the capacity of a journalist. But I'm highly skeptical of this reasoning. When I look at the Twitter profile of any given mainstream (e.g. ostensibly left-leaning) journalist, I'll find that I have dozens if not hundreds of mutual followers (e.g. "Followers you know"). If I look at the profile of an ostensibly right-leaning journalists (e.g. a Daily Caller reporter), the number of mutual followers is inevitably fewer [0]. I think you misestimate a few variables. For starters, journalists and most mainstream Twitter users are not inclined to doing gruntwork, such as curating a list of people to follow and then mute. Similarly, the use of Twitter lists, which also involves the manual gruntwork of curation, is very rare among the many personal accounts I follow. For 99% of everyday use (i.e. not specifically investigating someone's social media activity), journalists and mainstream users also lack the interest in analyzing a given user's followings list. Occasionally I see people mention FollowersAudit/BotOrNot. Can't remember the last time I've seen someone mention a purported political audit tool. In fact, I can't remember the last time I've seen someone mention tools like https://doesfollow.com/ https://doesfollow.com/. You also underestimate the perceived value of following-to-followers ratio. Almost all of the big name Twitter accounts (again, not just journalists) follow a relative handful of accounts versus followers count. It's widely perceived that a small accounts-followed number is a signal of prestige, or at least self-importance. Thus, an even lower incentive to pad that number in hopes of boosting a hard-to-perceive impartiality metric. Anyway, the proof should be in the pudding. Are there any notable accounts that obviously stuff their followings with people they politically dislike/hate, for the purpose of pretending to be non-partisan? Shouldn't we see this in the brand accounts, like @nytimes [1], which have a desire to be seen as fair and also have no obligation/expectation to actually engage via retweet/reply? [0] In this case, I don't think the reason is primarily caused by ideology; the number of right-leaning news outlets are far and few between, which reduces the potential of direct personal/professional ties. I find that the few former DCaller reporters who have moved to larger outlets and who I follow do not have a disparity in mutuals) [1] Here's a CSV dump of @nytimes ~900 followed accounts, which are almost all NYT employees: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1sW_ZmgONfsAIy1IKsETJJA9RaCuGQEXSwFCfvzjiIAA/edit#gid=0 https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1sW_ZmgONfsAIy1IKsETJ...

jb775 6y ago

> Journalists have already been called out for this This makes it even worse. They were called out for living in an echo chamber and refused to acknowledge or fix it. > Anyone can have multiple Twitter accounts This is a generous assumption. Considering we're here talking about cold hard facts scraped from Twitter, a blanket assumption like this to disregard everything found is poor form. You sound like a journalist.

deleted 6y ago
[deleted]