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I got my twitter account MyfirstnameMylastname somewhere early in the site's existence, probably around 2009. But never really got the appeal of Twitter so I ne

I got my twitter account MyfirstnameMylastname somewhere early in the site's existence, probably around 2009. But never really got the appeal of Twitter so I never used it for anything, I'd check it once every six months or so. I eventually learned I share a name with a tech journalist who is very active on Twitter, and occasionally I would get tagged instead instead of him. Every time, I would respond with the Navy Seal Copypasta, broken into eight twitter sized parts. Eventually they banned me for this. And thus ended my Twitter adventure for good.

buryat 5y ago
> Every time, I would respond with the Navy Seal Copypasta, broken into eight twitter sized parts. Eventually they banned me for this. yeah, people like you should be banned
- gameman144 5y ago
  Is this sarcasm? If not, I'd love to hear the rationale behind this, as to me this seems far less objectionable than lots of things which happen on mainstream Twitter.
  - newsbinator 5y ago
    I suppose the charitable argument for banning would be: it pollutes Twitter without extending any conversations or bringing anybody joy per se. Basically it's spam. Certainly on HN that person would/should be banned right away (which is part of the reason HN is the best place on the internet). But Twitter is a different animal. So are Reddit and 4Chan. Sarcastic copypasta is par for the course.
    - f1refly 5y ago
      > it pollutes Twitter without extending any conversations or bringing anybody joy per se. Basically it's spam. Looking from the outside, this is an accurate description of 99,99% of all messages ever written on twitter. Arguably, the copy pasted text can at least bring a bit of joy which other tweets also fail at.
  - rNULLED 5y ago
    Consider that so many people do not care to preserve the environments of online public spaces. While the pollution of digital environments with semiotic trash is less tangible and persistent than the beer cans, cigarette butts, and used needles on the streets of our cities, can you really defend its production? What kinds of cultures, mindsets, and personalities would this breed? Yes, there are far worse things. But let us hold ourselves to our own high standards and be proud.
    - gameman144 5y ago
      One man's semiotic trash is another man's humorous treasure. Note that I'm not saying that I'm a fan of low-quality posts like this, just that I feel that the lion's share of Twitter is low-quality posts, so it seems odd to single out a copy-pasta meme as being unworthy while allowing... well, the rest of Twitter.
      - Wojtkie 5y ago
        Should have pulled a KenM and just replied with extremely geriatric answers and explanations to everything
        MiddleEndian 5y ago
        On the topic of geriatric twittering, the one time I did not respond with the navy seal copypasta was when some older high school sports coach tagged me instead of his student athlete with the same name (whose twitter handle was completely different). I felt like that would have been too confusing an experience for him.
  - abruzzi 5y ago
    I'd never heard of "navy seal copypasta", so I googled it, and to my read, its very hard to see any >wink< >wink< in the text, which ends after a long screed, with threats of violence against the poster. So I think its reasonable to believe that maybe on of the people on the twitter abuse team didn't get the joke and instead saw what on its surface looks like a threat. I don't know twitter's ToS, but I'm guessing that if taken literally that text could violate them.
    - mardifoufs 5y ago
      The part about "gorilla warfare" wasn't a hint?
      - tekknik 5y ago
        There’s also the part about “you’re dead”, which is a crime. The one time someone assumes this is a joke and then something bad happens…
      - toomanyrichies 5y ago
        No, it wasn’t. There are plenty of people online who both a) can’t spell, and b) are unhinged enough to make genuine threats against a stranger’s life.
- mdoms 5y ago
  User who is receiving unsolicited messages from strangers should be the one banned because he decides to respond with a little joke?
  - Graffur 5y ago
    I think he spammed the same text every time. Definitely worthy of a ban for any community online or offline.
    - MiddleEndian 5y ago
      Yeah I mean realistically, if I did challenge the ban and get them to unban me, I'd just immediately do the same thing again the next time I mistakenly got tagged lol
    - xdennis 5y ago
      Spam is unsolicited. You don't get to message someone and cry "spam" when he replies.
      - Graffur 5y ago
        Don't get emotionally invested in this. His messages are unsolicited even if they tagged his account. They are also irrelevant which makes them spam.
        Dylan16807 5y ago
        > also irrelevant It sounds like you're saying that even if the messages were relevant, such as "you tagged the wrong account", that would be unsolicited? A single burst of tweets is very solidly solicited when you tag someone, even if it was by mistake. > Don't get emotionally invested in this. What in the world do you mean by "emotionally invested"? That reads like a weird way of being unwarrantedly dismissive.
        Graffur 5y ago
dogleash 5y ago
>Navy Seal Copypasta, broken into eight twitter sized parts. Eventually they banned me for this Fucking killjoys. If twitter is moderating for people who can't even figure out not to take that copypasta seriously[1], then they're showing their hand. There's no end state. No goal. There is no cultural equilibrium point that even perfect moderation could ever achieve. Therefore, visible attrition is the end state. Twitter has to satisfy the normies who want to be on the internet but don't understand the internet. The moderation is a con because it can't be anything else. Lying "we're working on it, see?" to the monied/powerful normies who's continued use keep Twitter's stock price out of the dumpster. [1]: It's not that people should recognize copypasta, it's that people should recognize the words of an idiot. This meme became a meme because how well everyone recognized the earnest original author of that post couldn't be taken seriously.
- manmal 5y ago
  IMO it’s not unreasonable to ban users who are outliers in terms of complaints from other users.
  - deleted 5y ago
    [deleted]
  - roenxi 5y ago
    It isn't workable. If you ban the 2% most complained about users there will still be a 2% most complained about users. There should be something as close as possible to an objective standard of what is and isn't allowed.
    - esperent 5y ago
      Do you have any evidence they are doing this? I rather think they are using a threshold like > 10 complaints in a certain time period.
      - Mordisquitos 5y ago
        Supposing they do use a threshold based on an absolute value, by what measure would they have chosen this value in the first place? How, when, and why would they review this value? In the end, if their decision process is based purely on a number, it will eventually become a popularity contest or an excluder of outliers. It's turtles all the way down.
erichocean 5y ago
LOL, similar for me (2008, @FirstnameLastname) but I got banned early 2020 despite not tweeting.[0] I followed lots of CS people that I now have lost. At least you got banned for doing something to annoy The Twitter. [0] I appealed and was told I had evaded a previous ban! Obviously…no, no I didn't.
- MiddleEndian 5y ago
  I suppose I could have just been randomly banned as well lol. I just assumed that was the reason because I never used it for anything else. They never gave me a reason and I never bothered to challenge it.
manmal 5y ago
Is there something else to learn from this story besides not insulting people?
- 0xbadcafebee 5y ago
  Yeah, actually a fundamental rule of comedy: always get the audience on your side. If they don't know you, aren't rooting for you, or think you're on the "wrong side", they will misinterpret your joke as a real insult. Comedians directly insult people all the time and get laughs, but only because the audience believes they're on the same side as the comedian.
  - manmal 5y ago
    I didn’t expect such a constructive reply, thanks!
  - MiddleEndian 5y ago
    True, but that's assuming my audience is the people I'm replying to!
  - tekknik 5y ago
    Did nobody read the entire copypasta? What comedian jokes using death threats?
    - fwn 5y ago
      To quote Achmed, the dead terrorist: "Silence, I kill you!" https://youtube.com/watch?v=xKlehf_4rRg https://youtube.com/watch?v=xKlehf_4rRg It's not only a death threat, it appears to be said by a committed terrorist. ;) On a more serious note: humor, satire and sarcasm are typically super hard to categorize, especially at scale. It's an unsolved problem.
    - deleted 5y ago
      [deleted]

buryat 5y ago

> Every time, I would respond with the Navy Seal Copypasta, broken into eight twitter sized parts. Eventually they banned me for this. yeah, people like you should be banned

gameman144 5y ago
Is this sarcasm? If not, I'd love to hear the rationale behind this, as to me this seems far less objectionable than lots of things which happen on mainstream Twitter.
- newsbinator 5y ago
  I suppose the charitable argument for banning would be: it pollutes Twitter without extending any conversations or bringing anybody joy per se. Basically it's spam. Certainly on HN that person would/should be banned right away (which is part of the reason HN is the best place on the internet). But Twitter is a different animal. So are Reddit and 4Chan. Sarcastic copypasta is par for the course.
  - f1refly 5y ago
    > it pollutes Twitter without extending any conversations or bringing anybody joy per se. Basically it's spam. Looking from the outside, this is an accurate description of 99,99% of all messages ever written on twitter. Arguably, the copy pasted text can at least bring a bit of joy which other tweets also fail at.
- rNULLED 5y ago
  Consider that so many people do not care to preserve the environments of online public spaces. While the pollution of digital environments with semiotic trash is less tangible and persistent than the beer cans, cigarette butts, and used needles on the streets of our cities, can you really defend its production? What kinds of cultures, mindsets, and personalities would this breed? Yes, there are far worse things. But let us hold ourselves to our own high standards and be proud.
  - gameman144 5y ago
    One man's semiotic trash is another man's humorous treasure. Note that I'm not saying that I'm a fan of low-quality posts like this, just that I feel that the lion's share of Twitter is low-quality posts, so it seems odd to single out a copy-pasta meme as being unworthy while allowing... well, the rest of Twitter.
    - Wojtkie 5y ago
      Should have pulled a KenM and just replied with extremely geriatric answers and explanations to everything
      - MiddleEndian 5y ago
        On the topic of geriatric twittering, the one time I did not respond with the navy seal copypasta was when some older high school sports coach tagged me instead of his student athlete with the same name (whose twitter handle was completely different). I felt like that would have been too confusing an experience for him.
- abruzzi 5y ago
  I'd never heard of "navy seal copypasta", so I googled it, and to my read, its very hard to see any >wink< >wink< in the text, which ends after a long screed, with threats of violence against the poster. So I think its reasonable to believe that maybe on of the people on the twitter abuse team didn't get the joke and instead saw what on its surface looks like a threat. I don't know twitter's ToS, but I'm guessing that if taken literally that text could violate them.
  - mardifoufs 5y ago
    The part about "gorilla warfare" wasn't a hint?
    - tekknik 5y ago
      There’s also the part about “you’re dead”, which is a crime. The one time someone assumes this is a joke and then something bad happens…
    - toomanyrichies 5y ago
      No, it wasn’t. There are plenty of people online who both a) can’t spell, and b) are unhinged enough to make genuine threats against a stranger’s life.
mdoms 5y ago
User who is receiving unsolicited messages from strangers should be the one banned because he decides to respond with a little joke?
- Graffur 5y ago
  I think he spammed the same text every time. Definitely worthy of a ban for any community online or offline.
  - MiddleEndian 5y ago
    Yeah I mean realistically, if I did challenge the ban and get them to unban me, I'd just immediately do the same thing again the next time I mistakenly got tagged lol
  - xdennis 5y ago
    Spam is unsolicited. You don't get to message someone and cry "spam" when he replies.
    - Graffur 5y ago
      Don't get emotionally invested in this. His messages are unsolicited even if they tagged his account. They are also irrelevant which makes them spam.
      - Dylan16807 5y ago
        > also irrelevant It sounds like you're saying that even if the messages were relevant, such as "you tagged the wrong account", that would be unsolicited? A single burst of tweets is very solidly solicited when you tag someone, even if it was by mistake. > Don't get emotionally invested in this. What in the world do you mean by "emotionally invested"? That reads like a weird way of being unwarrantedly dismissive.
        Graffur 5y ago

dogleash 5y ago

>Navy Seal Copypasta, broken into eight twitter sized parts. Eventually they banned me for this Fucking killjoys. If twitter is moderating for people who can't even figure out not to take that copypasta seriously[1], then they're showing their hand. There's no end state. No goal. There is no cultural equilibrium point that even perfect moderation could ever achieve. Therefore, visible attrition is the end state. Twitter has to satisfy the normies who want to be on the internet but don't understand the internet. The moderation is a con because it can't be anything else. Lying "we're working on it, see?" to the monied/powerful normies who's continued use keep Twitter's stock price out of the dumpster. [1]: It's not that people should recognize copypasta, it's that people should recognize the words of an idiot. This meme became a meme because how well everyone recognized the earnest original author of that post couldn't be taken seriously.

manmal 5y ago
IMO it’s not unreasonable to ban users who are outliers in terms of complaints from other users.
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
- roenxi 5y ago
  It isn't workable. If you ban the 2% most complained about users there will still be a 2% most complained about users. There should be something as close as possible to an objective standard of what is and isn't allowed.
  - esperent 5y ago
    Do you have any evidence they are doing this? I rather think they are using a threshold like > 10 complaints in a certain time period.
    - Mordisquitos 5y ago
      Supposing they do use a threshold based on an absolute value, by what measure would they have chosen this value in the first place? How, when, and why would they review this value? In the end, if their decision process is based purely on a number, it will eventually become a popularity contest or an excluder of outliers. It's turtles all the way down.

erichocean 5y ago

LOL, similar for me (2008, @FirstnameLastname) but I got banned early 2020 despite not tweeting.[0] I followed lots of CS people that I now have lost. At least you got banned for doing something to annoy The Twitter. [0] I appealed and was told I had evaded a previous ban! Obviously…no, no I didn't.

MiddleEndian 5y ago
I suppose I could have just been randomly banned as well lol. I just assumed that was the reason because I never used it for anything else. They never gave me a reason and I never bothered to challenge it.

manmal 5y ago

Is there something else to learn from this story besides not insulting people?

0xbadcafebee 5y ago
Yeah, actually a fundamental rule of comedy: always get the audience on your side. If they don't know you, aren't rooting for you, or think you're on the "wrong side", they will misinterpret your joke as a real insult. Comedians directly insult people all the time and get laughs, but only because the audience believes they're on the same side as the comedian.
- manmal 5y ago
  I didn’t expect such a constructive reply, thanks!
- MiddleEndian 5y ago
  True, but that's assuming my audience is the people I'm replying to!
- tekknik 5y ago
  Did nobody read the entire copypasta? What comedian jokes using death threats?
  - fwn 5y ago
    To quote Achmed, the dead terrorist: "Silence, I kill you!" https://youtube.com/watch?v=xKlehf_4rRg https://youtube.com/watch?v=xKlehf_4rRg It's not only a death threat, it appears to be said by a committed terrorist. ;) On a more serious note: humor, satire and sarcasm are typically super hard to categorize, especially at scale. It's an unsolved problem.
  - deleted 5y ago
    [deleted]