4 ms·

I personally would love to see how many people a person has Blocked, similar to Following/Followers number. would find it very informative about a tweeter

swader999 4y ago
Agree. Anonymous dissent has a real place in a functioning democracy.
- tensor 4y ago
  What does blocking someone have to do with anonymous dissent?
guerrilla 4y ago
So you can judge how much they are harassed? Why would you care?
- pastor_bob 4y ago
  This assumes that people only block others because they are harassed by them. When Mark Anderson blocked Jack Dorsey was it because of harassment? To me, something like that is a valuable piece of info. I wouldn't have known had Jack not pointed it out.
  - guerrilla 4y ago
    It's an excellent assumption though because that's what most people do most of the time.
ar_lan 4y ago
I have been blocked by so many people solely because of people I follow - many of whom I don't follow because I like them, but they have an effect on broader communities and it's good to keep tabs on them. There are notable actors/actresses who've blocked me because of this. It just immediately makes me dislike anything they are in because I just can't think of them as a person worth respecting.
- tnorthcutt 4y ago
  How do you notice when a notable actor/actress has blocked you?
AndyNemmity 4y ago
I don't know why, my block list is over 60k. Why? We used to be able to import block lists, so I have 59,990 or whatever accounts blocked that spam.
runako 4y ago
In general, I would expect a person's blocklist to correlate roughly with how active they are on the site, and how long they have been on the site. More activity leads to more interactions with spam and other undesirable accounts. I'm not sure how that confers much useful information about a user.
- pastor_bob 4y ago
  Well in Elon's ideal world the spam bots would be purged so they'd have no presence on block lists. Ideally the blocked list would be viewable. I think it's important if you believe Twitter is 'the town square', people should be able to see who and who isn't allowed to enter that town square to respond.
  - runako 4y ago
    Spam extends beyond bots! Besides, there's also still the "and other undesirable" accounts part. There are a lot of reasons a person may choose to block another account, from harassment to simply curating a better experience for themselves. > people should be able to see who and who isn't allowed to enter that town square to respond. Do you use Twitter? This isn't how Twitter works at all. The fact that a person blocks you doesn't prevent you from entering the "Town Square" in any way.
  - scaramanga 4y ago
    Not likely. This is a strange kind of town square. First of all, it has to protect wealthy elites, emperors, and so on, in a society with appalling wealth inequality. All people who would be unable to enter a town square without elite soldiers / praetorian guard / varangian guard to protect them. Secondly, this town square is not a public space, it's the wholly owned private property of a collection of ultra-wealthy people and institutions (or a single wealthy individual, who may as well be Caligula at this point). Finally, the town square already isn't a great model: there were town squares during the reign of Caligula, the entire institution of serfdom, during slavery in the American colonies, during Jim Crow. What was discussed there? Whose "free speech" was protected there?
- 4y ago
stjohnswarts 4y ago
I think that would be a bad idea because it might make the person a target for haters.

swader999 4y ago

Agree. Anonymous dissent has a real place in a functioning democracy.

tensor 4y ago
What does blocking someone have to do with anonymous dissent?

guerrilla 4y ago

So you can judge how much they are harassed? Why would you care?

pastor_bob 4y ago
This assumes that people only block others because they are harassed by them. When Mark Anderson blocked Jack Dorsey was it because of harassment? To me, something like that is a valuable piece of info. I wouldn't have known had Jack not pointed it out.
- guerrilla 4y ago
  It's an excellent assumption though because that's what most people do most of the time.

ar_lan 4y ago

I have been blocked by so many people solely because of people I follow - many of whom I don't follow because I like them, but they have an effect on broader communities and it's good to keep tabs on them. There are notable actors/actresses who've blocked me because of this. It just immediately makes me dislike anything they are in because I just can't think of them as a person worth respecting.

tnorthcutt 4y ago
How do you notice when a notable actor/actress has blocked you?

AndyNemmity 4y ago

I don't know why, my block list is over 60k. Why? We used to be able to import block lists, so I have 59,990 or whatever accounts blocked that spam.

runako 4y ago

In general, I would expect a person's blocklist to correlate roughly with how active they are on the site, and how long they have been on the site. More activity leads to more interactions with spam and other undesirable accounts. I'm not sure how that confers much useful information about a user.

pastor_bob 4y ago
Well in Elon's ideal world the spam bots would be purged so they'd have no presence on block lists. Ideally the blocked list would be viewable. I think it's important if you believe Twitter is 'the town square', people should be able to see who and who isn't allowed to enter that town square to respond.
- runako 4y ago
  Spam extends beyond bots! Besides, there's also still the "and other undesirable" accounts part. There are a lot of reasons a person may choose to block another account, from harassment to simply curating a better experience for themselves. > people should be able to see who and who isn't allowed to enter that town square to respond. Do you use Twitter? This isn't how Twitter works at all. The fact that a person blocks you doesn't prevent you from entering the "Town Square" in any way.
- scaramanga 4y ago
  Not likely. This is a strange kind of town square. First of all, it has to protect wealthy elites, emperors, and so on, in a society with appalling wealth inequality. All people who would be unable to enter a town square without elite soldiers / praetorian guard / varangian guard to protect them. Secondly, this town square is not a public space, it's the wholly owned private property of a collection of ultra-wealthy people and institutions (or a single wealthy individual, who may as well be Caligula at this point). Finally, the town square already isn't a great model: there were town squares during the reign of Caligula, the entire institution of serfdom, during slavery in the American colonies, during Jim Crow. What was discussed there? Whose "free speech" was protected there?
4y ago

stjohnswarts 4y ago

I think that would be a bad idea because it might make the person a target for haters.