4 ms·

Imagine if Twitter had suspended Vox, the NYT, or any other beloved liberal news org. You can't. Impossible. How much unsubstantiated stuff about Donald Trump w

Imagine if Twitter had suspended Vox, the NYT, or any other beloved liberal news org. You can't. Impossible. How much unsubstantiated stuff about Donald Trump was propagated by these outlets for years? What's the fundamental difference between opposition research like the Steele Dossier, and "hacking"? Imagine the outrage if Elon tomorrow decided to suspend one of these news orgs, even with only a few days to go before the election. Compare that to the crickets we hear about the NY Post.

llamaimperative 4y ago
They didn’t suspend the Post, did they? I remember them banning that article. And could I imagine them banning a Vox or NYT article? Well no, because for better or worse, not being an actual tabloid tends to impart more trust than being an actual tabloid does. NYPost is broadly regarded as a tabloid and NYT is broadly regarded as the paper of record. Should it be this way? Will it stay this way? I don’t know. If there’s a left wing analog to NYPost, I can definitely imagine an article getting deboosted or banned under similar conditions.
- bhawks 4y ago
  They suspended the NY Post account for over 2 weeks. (only lifting the suspension as their policy evolved). Prior to that Twitter had never taken such action against a news outlet. https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2020/oct/30/twitter-new-york-post-freeze-policy-reversal https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2020/oct/30/twitter-n...
  - ethanbond 4y ago
    Eh, it’s kind of between banning the article and banning the account I suppose. They froze the account until the Post deleted the 6 offending tweets, and the Post declined to do that. Again would be a very believable standoff with any publisher once the story was in question.
    - cdash 4y ago
      Twitter can delete the tweets themselves, that whole policy is a farce and is nothing but trying to extract a coercive confession.

llamaimperative 4y ago

They didn’t suspend the Post, did they? I remember them banning that article. And could I imagine them banning a Vox or NYT article? Well no, because for better or worse, not being an actual tabloid tends to impart more trust than being an actual tabloid does. NYPost is broadly regarded as a tabloid and NYT is broadly regarded as the paper of record. Should it be this way? Will it stay this way? I don’t know. If there’s a left wing analog to NYPost, I can definitely imagine an article getting deboosted or banned under similar conditions.

bhawks 4y ago
They suspended the NY Post account for over 2 weeks. (only lifting the suspension as their policy evolved). Prior to that Twitter had never taken such action against a news outlet. https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2020/oct/30/twitter-new-york-post-freeze-policy-reversal https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2020/oct/30/twitter-n...
- ethanbond 4y ago
  Eh, it’s kind of between banning the article and banning the account I suppose. They froze the account until the Post deleted the 6 offending tweets, and the Post declined to do that. Again would be a very believable standoff with any publisher once the story was in question.
  - cdash 4y ago
    Twitter can delete the tweets themselves, that whole policy is a farce and is nothing but trying to extract a coercive confession.