8 ms·

EFF: Twitter Has a New Owner. Here’s What He Should Do

61 points by guerrilla 4y ago

mc32 4y ago
Where were you EFF when Twitter was agog in deplatforming voices that went awry of progressivist ideas? Not hateful stuff, just things that questioned certian things, like effectiveness of masks, source of the virus, etc. Now these ideas are important again? It seems the EFF pays attention to political winds. I also seem to recall them saying, well, free speech is nice and all, but as a private company, eh, it wasn't actually censorship.
- DiabloD3 4y ago
  EFF pays attention to when screaming into the void isn't helpful.
- dredmorbius 4y ago
  A DDG search reveals ~40 results for twitter and deplatforming at eff.org: https://duckduckgo.com/?q=site%3Aeff.org+twitter+deplatforming&ia=web https://duckduckgo.com/?q=site%3Aeff.org+twitter+deplatformi... !g suggests 238 results. Had you looked prior to your comment?
- seattle_spring 4y ago
  Considering I can't go an hour without someone ramming this perspective down my throat, perhaps it wasn't as "censored" as your claims suggest?
- Proven 4y ago
newbamboo 4y ago
Et Tu EFF? Sigh. I remember when they supported open source. Won’t give them my support going forward. At least rms is still alive and kicking.
- ncmncm 4y ago
  They don't need it if they get Elon on board. But they won't. To get out the value he poured in, he will need to run it the way Murdoch runs Fox News, the WSJ, and lots else. Twitter is a bigger megaphone than even the Murdoch empire.
- xhkkffbf 4y ago
  Two years ago, I personally complained to EFF folks that I knew about the censorship of Twitter users like the NY Post. They said nothing. They seemed to have chosen sides. Long ago they cared about censorship and free speech. Now I just don't know.
  - type0 4y ago
    I noticed it as well, they were slowly sliding in hopes no one would notice, when did EFF became ideological?
    - giraffe_lady 4y ago
      They're an advocacy campaign for a certain set of issues. That always has been ideological, come on. You almost can't find a purer example honestly, it's their entire purpose and the reason they exist. Which issues they focus on and how definitely does change over time. Maybe you don't like those changes, but they didn't suddenly become something they weren't before.
    - newbamboo 4y ago
      Maybe when the late great JPB passed on? Hurts my ears to listen, burns my eyes to see.
bavell 4y ago
I stopped reading after the first paragraph, couldn't get past the obvious slant from the authors. Genuinely curious, did EFF write a similar article when Bezos bought the WP? (I searched but couldn't find anything). I hope so because otherwise this is very hypocritical. I'd be glad to be wrong on this but I suspect I'm not.
- daveoc64 4y ago
  Why would EFF care about a newspaper?
  - bavell 4y ago
    Literally the first sentence of the article: > Elon Musk’s purchase of Twitter highlights the risks to human rights and personal safety when any single person has complete control over policies affecting almost 400 million users. Doesn't this apply to Bezos and WP? You could argue WP doesn't have the same reach in terms of raw numbers which is fair but I'd argue both their audiences have a lot of power and the overall point made by EFF applies in both cases.
    - wbsss4412 4y ago
      WP is neither of the same magnitude, nor is it the similar in kind. WP is not nor was it ever a platform in the sense that Twitter is.
- MattRix 4y ago
  In what way is it hypocritical? Surely you don’t believe they have to have an article about every media takeover before writing about this one.
  - bavell 4y ago
    No, I certainly don't believe that. But if they report on one billionaire buying a major media platform / outlet, shouldn't they do it for the others? I mean, it's not like this stuff happens everyday.
deleted 4y ago
[deleted]
tempnow987 4y ago
Ironic seeing this from the EFF. This is after we had CORPORATE control of twitter (which they apparently applaud) that provided us with endless spam / scam bots and tons of crap. I don't doubt Musk poses critical threats to the old way of doing things. Does EFF get a bunch of corporate type sponsorship? This is such a weird read.
- craftyguy 4y ago
  > This is after we had CORPORATE control of twitter (which they apparently applaud) ... they aren't aplauding it. They are offering suggestions now that twitter is under new ownership, since the previous owners were inept. It's likely that musk is equally inept (or worse.)
  - jimmygrapes 4y ago
    I think the question is really why did it take this long for the EFF to chime in? Perhaps they did and nobody cared enough for things to change, or maybe didn't feel like it was worth the effort. Maybe they see an opportunity to take advantage of the moment.
    - JumpCrisscross 4y ago
      > why did it take this long for the EFF to chime in? "EFF collaborated with organizations from around the world to create the Santa Clara Principles, which lay out a framework for how companies should operate with respect to transparency and accountability in content moderation decisions. Twitter publicly supported the first version of the Santa Clara Principles in its 2019 transparency report." https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2022/04/twitter-has-new-owner-heres-what-he-should-do https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2022/04/twitter-has-new-owner-... this article
      - jimmygrapes 4y ago
        Thanks, I knew I was missing something because there's no way all this e-drama was ignored by them (us? can I say us?) until now.
MiddleEndian 4y ago
- sieabahlpark 4y ago
  There's a handy verge article that explains how to deactivate and stop participating in Twitter. You're more than capable of achieving that yourself.
  - MiddleEndian 4y ago
    I don't use it. But it shows up on other things, like news articles or during live sporting events. If it were gone, I'd no longer be annoyed at that one aspect of reality.
_-david-_ 4y ago
>Elon Musk’s purchase of Twitter highlights the risks to human rights and personal safety when any single person has complete control over policies affecting almost 400 million users Elon is more dangerous to human rights than the Saudi government (partially) owning Twitter?
- paxys 4y ago
  Yes? What control do you think their low single digit percentage ownership gave them over day to day operations of Twitter?
  - tempnow987 4y ago
    Interesting seeing the Saudi defenses here. The reality is their staff looked up people's personal info to dox them. This was concerning because they were willing to kill people who said bad stuff about the Saudi's. Claiming elon is going to snoop through twitter to try and kill people is ridiculous. That was what TWITTER (corporate version) allowed to happen. "Ali Alzabarah, a Saudi citizen — was accused of accessing the personal information of more than 6,000 Twitter accounts in 2015 on behalf of Saudi Arabia. "
- thulle 4y ago
  Saudi investors with 5% share is pretty far from "complete control" though?
  - LegitShady 4y ago
    the saudis had actual employees in twitter looking at people's private info and passing it along to them, and the US dropped charges so people sued instead https://www.theverge.com/2020/7/28/21345794/twitter-employees-saudi-arabia-spies-charges-dropped-case-dismissed https://www.theverge.com/2020/7/28/21345794/twitter-employee...
AlchemistCamp 4y ago
I strongly agree with this part: > Pseudonymity and anonymity are essential to protecting users who may have opinions, identities, or interests that do not align with those in power. Their suggestion to open the platform up to more 3rd party devs is good, too. I’d love to see Blue Sky become more than vaporware.
- tempnow987 4y ago
  I just wish they'd declutter the web page. Stop suggesting other folks I might follow (I don't). Just give me the tweets of the person I'm on. And block all the spam stuff. So annoying. At least let me filter between real people who've done something to prove they are a person and the bots. For those who like the bots they can toggle the bots on.
  - robbedpeter 4y ago
    Or hire private mercenaries to firebomb bot farms. He's got the money. Hire those YouTube hackers who pwn scam call centers to find the bad guys, run all the people out and torch the servers and phones and buildings. Modern society is too polite and civil.
    - mrtesthah 4y ago
      Wouldn't that be wonderful? But the truth is that the bot farms will transform into Tesla-loving fanboys who just happen to intersperse strategic Russian talking points and news favorable to fascist-populist candidates.
  - SkyMarshal 4y ago
    > I just wish they'd declutter the web page. Stop suggesting other folks I might follow (I don't). Just give me the tweets of the person I'm on. Second this. I only want to see what people I follow actually say or retweet, and nothing else. I don’t care what they like/heart, I don’t care what people they follow say if I’m not following that person too, etc. I only want to see comments and retweets of people I directly follow. The reason is because you can only fit so much stuff in your timeline, and you have to pare it down somehow. I curate my follow list carefully for this reason, and don’t want any extraneous timeline items that displace the tweets and retweets I want to see.
timcavel 4y ago
fallingfrog 4y ago
[flagged]
- JumpCrisscross 4y ago
  > one thing that will happen is that there will be no limits on bad behavior anymore Zero chance this happens. Keep in mind, this is a leveraged buyout. We don't know what covenants the lenders will insist on. But scaring away all the advertisers will not be part of the permitted playbook.
- tomcam 4y ago
  > In my experience when right wingers complain about censorship this is what they most want to be able to do. Like Taylor Lorenz, the New York Times, and CNN?
- raxxorraxor 4y ago
  I am no right winger but concerned about a narrowing corridor of acceptable opinions. I have never harassed anyone on the internet, not am I particularly interested to contact celebs of any kind, even those that I do like. A renaissance of freedom of speech isn't anything negative, we had enough stupid opinions about it recently and as in any time in history it needs to be defended.
Proven 4y ago

61 points by guerrilla 4y ago

mc32 4y ago

Where were you EFF when Twitter was agog in deplatforming voices that went awry of progressivist ideas? Not hateful stuff, just things that questioned certian things, like effectiveness of masks, source of the virus, etc. Now these ideas are important again? It seems the EFF pays attention to political winds. I also seem to recall them saying, well, free speech is nice and all, but as a private company, eh, it wasn't actually censorship.

DiabloD3 4y ago
EFF pays attention to when screaming into the void isn't helpful.
dredmorbius 4y ago
A DDG search reveals ~40 results for twitter and deplatforming at eff.org: https://duckduckgo.com/?q=site%3Aeff.org+twitter+deplatforming&ia=web https://duckduckgo.com/?q=site%3Aeff.org+twitter+deplatformi... !g suggests 238 results. Had you looked prior to your comment?
seattle_spring 4y ago
Considering I can't go an hour without someone ramming this perspective down my throat, perhaps it wasn't as "censored" as your claims suggest?
Proven 4y ago

newbamboo 4y ago

Et Tu EFF? Sigh. I remember when they supported open source. Won’t give them my support going forward. At least rms is still alive and kicking.

ncmncm 4y ago
They don't need it if they get Elon on board. But they won't. To get out the value he poured in, he will need to run it the way Murdoch runs Fox News, the WSJ, and lots else. Twitter is a bigger megaphone than even the Murdoch empire.
xhkkffbf 4y ago
Two years ago, I personally complained to EFF folks that I knew about the censorship of Twitter users like the NY Post. They said nothing. They seemed to have chosen sides. Long ago they cared about censorship and free speech. Now I just don't know.
- type0 4y ago
  I noticed it as well, they were slowly sliding in hopes no one would notice, when did EFF became ideological?
  - giraffe_lady 4y ago
    They're an advocacy campaign for a certain set of issues. That always has been ideological, come on. You almost can't find a purer example honestly, it's their entire purpose and the reason they exist. Which issues they focus on and how definitely does change over time. Maybe you don't like those changes, but they didn't suddenly become something they weren't before.
  - newbamboo 4y ago
    Maybe when the late great JPB passed on? Hurts my ears to listen, burns my eyes to see.

bavell 4y ago

I stopped reading after the first paragraph, couldn't get past the obvious slant from the authors. Genuinely curious, did EFF write a similar article when Bezos bought the WP? (I searched but couldn't find anything). I hope so because otherwise this is very hypocritical. I'd be glad to be wrong on this but I suspect I'm not.

daveoc64 4y ago
Why would EFF care about a newspaper?
- bavell 4y ago
  Literally the first sentence of the article: > Elon Musk’s purchase of Twitter highlights the risks to human rights and personal safety when any single person has complete control over policies affecting almost 400 million users. Doesn't this apply to Bezos and WP? You could argue WP doesn't have the same reach in terms of raw numbers which is fair but I'd argue both their audiences have a lot of power and the overall point made by EFF applies in both cases.
  - wbsss4412 4y ago
    WP is neither of the same magnitude, nor is it the similar in kind. WP is not nor was it ever a platform in the sense that Twitter is.
MattRix 4y ago
In what way is it hypocritical? Surely you don’t believe they have to have an article about every media takeover before writing about this one.
- bavell 4y ago
  No, I certainly don't believe that. But if they report on one billionaire buying a major media platform / outlet, shouldn't they do it for the others? I mean, it's not like this stuff happens everyday.

deleted 4y ago

[deleted]

tempnow987 4y ago

Ironic seeing this from the EFF. This is after we had CORPORATE control of twitter (which they apparently applaud) that provided us with endless spam / scam bots and tons of crap. I don't doubt Musk poses critical threats to the old way of doing things. Does EFF get a bunch of corporate type sponsorship? This is such a weird read.

craftyguy 4y ago
> This is after we had CORPORATE control of twitter (which they apparently applaud) ... they aren't aplauding it. They are offering suggestions now that twitter is under new ownership, since the previous owners were inept. It's likely that musk is equally inept (or worse.)
- jimmygrapes 4y ago
  I think the question is really why did it take this long for the EFF to chime in? Perhaps they did and nobody cared enough for things to change, or maybe didn't feel like it was worth the effort. Maybe they see an opportunity to take advantage of the moment.
  - JumpCrisscross 4y ago
    > why did it take this long for the EFF to chime in? "EFF collaborated with organizations from around the world to create the Santa Clara Principles, which lay out a framework for how companies should operate with respect to transparency and accountability in content moderation decisions. Twitter publicly supported the first version of the Santa Clara Principles in its 2019 transparency report." https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2022/04/twitter-has-new-owner-heres-what-he-should-do https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2022/04/twitter-has-new-owner-... this article
    - jimmygrapes 4y ago
      Thanks, I knew I was missing something because there's no way all this e-drama was ignored by them (us? can I say us?) until now.

MiddleEndian 4y ago

sieabahlpark 4y ago
There's a handy verge article that explains how to deactivate and stop participating in Twitter. You're more than capable of achieving that yourself.
- MiddleEndian 4y ago
  I don't use it. But it shows up on other things, like news articles or during live sporting events. If it were gone, I'd no longer be annoyed at that one aspect of reality.

_-david-_ 4y ago

>Elon Musk’s purchase of Twitter highlights the risks to human rights and personal safety when any single person has complete control over policies affecting almost 400 million users Elon is more dangerous to human rights than the Saudi government (partially) owning Twitter?

paxys 4y ago
Yes? What control do you think their low single digit percentage ownership gave them over day to day operations of Twitter?
- tempnow987 4y ago
  Interesting seeing the Saudi defenses here. The reality is their staff looked up people's personal info to dox them. This was concerning because they were willing to kill people who said bad stuff about the Saudi's. Claiming elon is going to snoop through twitter to try and kill people is ridiculous. That was what TWITTER (corporate version) allowed to happen. "Ali Alzabarah, a Saudi citizen — was accused of accessing the personal information of more than 6,000 Twitter accounts in 2015 on behalf of Saudi Arabia. "
thulle 4y ago
Saudi investors with 5% share is pretty far from "complete control" though?
- LegitShady 4y ago
  the saudis had actual employees in twitter looking at people's private info and passing it along to them, and the US dropped charges so people sued instead https://www.theverge.com/2020/7/28/21345794/twitter-employees-saudi-arabia-spies-charges-dropped-case-dismissed https://www.theverge.com/2020/7/28/21345794/twitter-employee...

AlchemistCamp 4y ago

I strongly agree with this part: > Pseudonymity and anonymity are essential to protecting users who may have opinions, identities, or interests that do not align with those in power. Their suggestion to open the platform up to more 3rd party devs is good, too. I’d love to see Blue Sky become more than vaporware.

tempnow987 4y ago
I just wish they'd declutter the web page. Stop suggesting other folks I might follow (I don't). Just give me the tweets of the person I'm on. And block all the spam stuff. So annoying. At least let me filter between real people who've done something to prove they are a person and the bots. For those who like the bots they can toggle the bots on.
- robbedpeter 4y ago
  Or hire private mercenaries to firebomb bot farms. He's got the money. Hire those YouTube hackers who pwn scam call centers to find the bad guys, run all the people out and torch the servers and phones and buildings. Modern society is too polite and civil.
  - mrtesthah 4y ago
    Wouldn't that be wonderful? But the truth is that the bot farms will transform into Tesla-loving fanboys who just happen to intersperse strategic Russian talking points and news favorable to fascist-populist candidates.
- SkyMarshal 4y ago
  > I just wish they'd declutter the web page. Stop suggesting other folks I might follow (I don't). Just give me the tweets of the person I'm on. Second this. I only want to see what people I follow actually say or retweet, and nothing else. I don’t care what they like/heart, I don’t care what people they follow say if I’m not following that person too, etc. I only want to see comments and retweets of people I directly follow. The reason is because you can only fit so much stuff in your timeline, and you have to pare it down somehow. I curate my follow list carefully for this reason, and don’t want any extraneous timeline items that displace the tweets and retweets I want to see.

timcavel 4y ago

fallingfrog 4y ago

[flagged]

JumpCrisscross 4y ago
> one thing that will happen is that there will be no limits on bad behavior anymore Zero chance this happens. Keep in mind, this is a leveraged buyout. We don't know what covenants the lenders will insist on. But scaring away all the advertisers will not be part of the permitted playbook.
tomcam 4y ago
> In my experience when right wingers complain about censorship this is what they most want to be able to do. Like Taylor Lorenz, the New York Times, and CNN?
raxxorraxor 4y ago
I am no right winger but concerned about a narrowing corridor of acceptable opinions. I have never harassed anyone on the internet, not am I particularly interested to contact celebs of any kind, even those that I do like. A renaissance of freedom of speech isn't anything negative, we had enough stupid opinions about it recently and as in any time in history it needs to be defended.

Proven 4y ago