4 ms·

A lot of people here are jumping to conclusions based on what could simply be a bug. Why not wait 24hrs and see if this is actually some policy or just a mistak

A lot of people here are jumping to conclusions based on what could simply be a bug. Why not wait 24hrs and see if this is actually some policy or just a mistake.

Kadin 4y ago
Because masquerading a controversial "feature" as a bug would be a good way to trial it, and see what the pushback from your users is like. Twitter doesn't have enough credibility left to deserve the benefit of the doubt.
SnowHill9902 4y ago
It’s a feature until it goes viral then it’s a bug.
tehlike 4y ago
It's a bug but HN crowds like to talk about the evil corps all the time.
- jaywalk 4y ago
  Twitter has done nothing to earn the benefit of the doubt in situations like this. Quite the opposite, in fact.
  - tehlike 4y ago
    Having been on the other side of things (not user generated content but advertisers etc), things are not as easy. Shit happens all the time.
- carapace 4y ago
  Do you remember the time that the "evil corps" conspired together to rip off their own developers to the tune of several billion dollars? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/High-Tech_Employee_Antitrust_Litigation https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/High-Tech_Employee_Antitrust_L... (The suit was filed against Adobe, Apple Inc., Google, Intel, Intuit, Pixar, Lucasfilm and eBay, but it turned out that "dozens" of other tech companies got involved as well (Pando Daily had good coverage https://web.archive.org/web/20200304045453/https://pando.com/tag/techtopus/ https://web.archive.org/web/20200304045453/https://pando.com... )) I figure these guys will do whatever they think they can get away with.
  - tehlike 4y ago
    You are mixing one issue with another. I am making a very specific claim that this issue is not malice, either a system with false positive or a system that has a bug.
    - carapace 4y ago
      FWIW, I agree. You're almost certainly right that this is just a false positive or a bug. I'm just pointing out that the "evil corps" stereotyped has been earned by past events. The folks who are suspicious of corporate behaviour and motives have their reasons.
      - tehlike 4y ago
        Once we make peace with the fact that employers are not family, and big corps are in it for profit, some level of skepticism is warranted. I am mostly thinking attributing _everything_ to malice or profit is wrong. Even then, nearly almost everyone here is using one or the other big corp product for free or paying for it, which feels ironic too. Like yeah, evil, but i will continue to use it is a funny concept. Accept things with flaws, call out stupid or malicious behavior, just don't think everything is evil
        carapace 4y ago
        Well said. Part of the problem is that different folks have different experience with and ideas about the folks running big corps, so we wind up over-generalizing and talking past each other. I did it myself above when I used "these guys" to mean a handful of bad actors, not the whole of all those companies' executive suites. > Like yeah, evil, but i will continue to use it is a funny concept. Yeah, I find that perplexing too.
gaius_baltar 4y ago
"It's a bug" is also a very convenient excuse for a lot of behaviors from the usual companies...
- serial_dev 4y ago
  It's a convenient excuse that IMO can actually be the truth, even if I am aware of the Hunter laptop and other censorship (sorry, disinformation prevention) cases the company had. I can see how some shady content had a similar URL/behavior that accidentally got this flagged (though I'm not a mastodon expert, so I might be wrong). I'd wait a day to see if the problem gets fixed. Even if they fix it, we will never know if it was a real bug or they hoped there wouldn't be backlash for this "feature".
SpicyLemonZest 4y ago
The logic of social media pileons is too pervasive at this point. As you can see upthread, a lot of people genuinely believe that they’re morally obligated to join these kind of pileons precisely because there’s not much information available; if we don’t apply pressure, there’ll never be a full investigation and they will get away with it! (And I very much include myself in "people" here, I've been there before many times.) I think you just have to accept these days that when you go on an online platform you’ll see a few outrage mobs gathered around some tiny scrap of information. It’s like walking into a nightclub and asking people why they won’t drink more responsibly.
can16358p 4y ago
They will of course say that it's a bug otherwise they're in potential great trouble. But "why" that "bug" was there in the first place is another issue.
mypalmike 4y ago
Yes. I tend to assume the people who are quick to think conspiracy and/or malice in these kinds of situations are either students or nontechnical users. If you've been working as a developer in the industry for a while, you've seen bugs like this many times.
anonymousab 4y ago
This was, is, a common refrain as Google slowly but surely ensured that Firefox users would run into blocking issues and mysterious performance bugs, every week, that disappear with merely a user agent change. Mighty convenient a supermajority of the time, these bugs. At some point when your scale is big enough and you are the dominant incumbent, whether something is due to wreckless accidents or intentional or "blind"/ignorant malice is a moot question. The responsibility is (and so too should the punishments be) the same. That must be treated as the necessary cost of operating at this scale.
bstar77 4y ago
Even if it isn't a bug, there's probably enough malicious stuff going on linked to these domains that it's justified. Even if the sites themselves are not producing malicious content, they are targeted by bad actors because the platform lacks the tech to detect and moderate said bad actors. And lets be honest, users of this platform are likely to be very susceptible to misinformation and manipulation.
alaricus 4y ago
Bug or malice, the end result is the same. I hope EU regulators pick on this and land a hefty fine.

A lot of people here are jumping to conclusions based on what could simply be a bug. Why not wait 24hrs and see if this is actually some policy or just a mistake.

Kadin 4y ago

Because masquerading a controversial "feature" as a bug would be a good way to trial it, and see what the pushback from your users is like. Twitter doesn't have enough credibility left to deserve the benefit of the doubt.

SnowHill9902 4y ago

It’s a feature until it goes viral then it’s a bug.

tehlike 4y ago

It's a bug but HN crowds like to talk about the evil corps all the time.

jaywalk 4y ago
Twitter has done nothing to earn the benefit of the doubt in situations like this. Quite the opposite, in fact.
- tehlike 4y ago
  Having been on the other side of things (not user generated content but advertisers etc), things are not as easy. Shit happens all the time.
carapace 4y ago
Do you remember the time that the "evil corps" conspired together to rip off their own developers to the tune of several billion dollars? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/High-Tech_Employee_Antitrust_Litigation https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/High-Tech_Employee_Antitrust_L... (The suit was filed against Adobe, Apple Inc., Google, Intel, Intuit, Pixar, Lucasfilm and eBay, but it turned out that "dozens" of other tech companies got involved as well (Pando Daily had good coverage https://web.archive.org/web/20200304045453/https://pando.com/tag/techtopus/ https://web.archive.org/web/20200304045453/https://pando.com... )) I figure these guys will do whatever they think they can get away with.
- tehlike 4y ago
  You are mixing one issue with another. I am making a very specific claim that this issue is not malice, either a system with false positive or a system that has a bug.
  - carapace 4y ago
    FWIW, I agree. You're almost certainly right that this is just a false positive or a bug. I'm just pointing out that the "evil corps" stereotyped has been earned by past events. The folks who are suspicious of corporate behaviour and motives have their reasons.
    - tehlike 4y ago
      Once we make peace with the fact that employers are not family, and big corps are in it for profit, some level of skepticism is warranted. I am mostly thinking attributing _everything_ to malice or profit is wrong. Even then, nearly almost everyone here is using one or the other big corp product for free or paying for it, which feels ironic too. Like yeah, evil, but i will continue to use it is a funny concept. Accept things with flaws, call out stupid or malicious behavior, just don't think everything is evil
      - carapace 4y ago
        Well said. Part of the problem is that different folks have different experience with and ideas about the folks running big corps, so we wind up over-generalizing and talking past each other. I did it myself above when I used "these guys" to mean a handful of bad actors, not the whole of all those companies' executive suites. > Like yeah, evil, but i will continue to use it is a funny concept. Yeah, I find that perplexing too.

gaius_baltar 4y ago

"It's a bug" is also a very convenient excuse for a lot of behaviors from the usual companies...

serial_dev 4y ago
It's a convenient excuse that IMO can actually be the truth, even if I am aware of the Hunter laptop and other censorship (sorry, disinformation prevention) cases the company had. I can see how some shady content had a similar URL/behavior that accidentally got this flagged (though I'm not a mastodon expert, so I might be wrong). I'd wait a day to see if the problem gets fixed. Even if they fix it, we will never know if it was a real bug or they hoped there wouldn't be backlash for this "feature".

SpicyLemonZest 4y ago

The logic of social media pileons is too pervasive at this point. As you can see upthread, a lot of people genuinely believe that they’re morally obligated to join these kind of pileons precisely because there’s not much information available; if we don’t apply pressure, there’ll never be a full investigation and they will get away with it! (And I very much include myself in "people" here, I've been there before many times.) I think you just have to accept these days that when you go on an online platform you’ll see a few outrage mobs gathered around some tiny scrap of information. It’s like walking into a nightclub and asking people why they won’t drink more responsibly.

can16358p 4y ago

They will of course say that it's a bug otherwise they're in potential great trouble. But "why" that "bug" was there in the first place is another issue.

mypalmike 4y ago

Yes. I tend to assume the people who are quick to think conspiracy and/or malice in these kinds of situations are either students or nontechnical users. If you've been working as a developer in the industry for a while, you've seen bugs like this many times.

anonymousab 4y ago

This was, is, a common refrain as Google slowly but surely ensured that Firefox users would run into blocking issues and mysterious performance bugs, every week, that disappear with merely a user agent change. Mighty convenient a supermajority of the time, these bugs. At some point when your scale is big enough and you are the dominant incumbent, whether something is due to wreckless accidents or intentional or "blind"/ignorant malice is a moot question. The responsibility is (and so too should the punishments be) the same. That must be treated as the necessary cost of operating at this scale.

bstar77 4y ago

Even if it isn't a bug, there's probably enough malicious stuff going on linked to these domains that it's justified. Even if the sites themselves are not producing malicious content, they are targeted by bad actors because the platform lacks the tech to detect and moderate said bad actors. And lets be honest, users of this platform are likely to be very susceptible to misinformation and manipulation.

alaricus 4y ago

Bug or malice, the end result is the same. I hope EU regulators pick on this and land a hefty fine.