4 ms·

I asked an innocent question, and got a lot of lengthy, technical responses. The platforms I mentioned service _billions_ of users. It seems to me regardless of

I asked an innocent question, and got a lot of lengthy, technical responses. The platforms I mentioned service _billions_ of users. It seems to me regardless of your opinion of "closed" or "insular" or "shoves ads", they're the big players right now and it's pointless to say "Oh, we're idealistic and we don't want ads or outages so we'll go with a feed that no one's heard of". The reality is that the vast majority of Wikipedia users are _not_ tech savvy DIYers who know better than everyone else. They're ordinary people looking stuff up every minute of the day. I would think that Wikipedia, despite its own vast size, could leverage the existing large platforms to achieve its goals (presenting unusual news or interesting facts, as their Twitter feed currently does, or explaining to people how Wikipedia works, how to contribute & edit content, etc.). As for youtube, well, why not video content? It would be great.

dragontamer 3y ago
I literally can't access Twitter anymore dude. Its cut off to people like me, who never bothered to make an account. I also don't have a Facebook account, so I can't access anything on Facebook either. There's nothing "technical" about this issue. Its a simple issue of access. I can read the above Mastodon post just fine. I cannot do the same with a hypothetical Twitter post.
- blisterpeanuts 3y ago
  Just out of curiosity, what prevents you from creating a Twitter account? Does it enable tracking or some other undesirable side effect?
  - dragontamer 3y ago
    Haven't needed one yet. Twitter's always been open before, and I've never felt the need to chime into discussion over there. 250 characters sucks for discussion. As far as my personal habits go, its easier for me to cut out Twitter forever (if they're going the crappy Quora model) rather than me making an account. What does Twitter offer me? All it is is a bunch of crappy, one-or-two sentence long comments with the occasional person taking screenshots of text whenever they want to bypass the character-limits. (Alternatively, they make X/46 posts to link tweets together so that they can actually form a cohesive point, but such behavior is better suited for a proper blogpost + Twitter link anyway). Discussion is incredibly shallow and the bulk of the "usefulness" is top-level posts that get reposted to other locations on the internet anyway. Discussion is consistently bad and shallow. Why would I ever want to join Twitter? Reading for points was all I ever did, and only when other people posted Twitter links.
    - blisterpeanuts 3y ago
      I think it depends on the particular discussion. In the pre-acquisition days, there were thousands (probably millions) of automated accounts posting garbage. Many of these have been removed. I recall that when Trump had an active account, his every tweet had a cascade of unbelievably vile, profane responses, incredibly nasty. This type of thing still happens but seems less than before. In more specialized topics such as crypto, technical, pets, etc., discussions seem tamer. But I don't consider Twitter really a place for discussions. It's just a microblogging platform. By the way, the paid tier ("blue check") now allows much longer postings than 280 characters.
      - dragontamer 3y ago
        Twitter could be an absolute heaven of discussion (not that I believe it'd be possible with 280 characters), but unless its open to anonymous users, don't expect me to read it any time soon. 1. I've read it enough over the past years to know what kind of discussion typically takes place on there. I'm glad we both agree that discussion is poor. 2. Blue-checkmarks to be heard better is literally pay-to-be-heard and is not a model I'm particularly fond of. Other pay-to-win structures are similarly anathema to how I want to have discussions with people. 3. Reports from media I trust contradict your opinion. Andrew Tate for example has been getting a lot of news recently, and it has become clear that Elon Musk paid Tate the posting bonus for being a popular guy on Twitter. Is that the kind of person Twitter wants to be elevating on their platform? You make it sound like bots are the problem. What about misogynistic assholes who (pending the results of their current trial) may have led a human trafficking ring? Are these the blue-checkmarks that people are boosting on the platform? There's something to be said about curation. Choosing who, and who does not, get boosted by your algorithms. You're talking about "vile" posts that you are glad are gone. What about Elon Musk's "cisgender" discussion? Is that the kind of stuff you like associating yourself with? 4. Respectable people I trust, such as plainsite, have been banned on Twitter. This is a chilling effect. If people I trust have been banned on Twitter, that lowers the odds of me participating in the discussion, because I know I'll be banned for posting public court documents and otherwise being a reasonable person. The moderation and kinds of people that this new Twitter is going for is definitely in the wrong direction for me. I never wanted Twitter before, but it has taken huge steps away from what I care to align myself with.

dragontamer 3y ago

I literally can't access Twitter anymore dude. Its cut off to people like me, who never bothered to make an account. I also don't have a Facebook account, so I can't access anything on Facebook either. There's nothing "technical" about this issue. Its a simple issue of access. I can read the above Mastodon post just fine. I cannot do the same with a hypothetical Twitter post.

blisterpeanuts 3y ago
Just out of curiosity, what prevents you from creating a Twitter account? Does it enable tracking or some other undesirable side effect?
- dragontamer 3y ago
  Haven't needed one yet. Twitter's always been open before, and I've never felt the need to chime into discussion over there. 250 characters sucks for discussion. As far as my personal habits go, its easier for me to cut out Twitter forever (if they're going the crappy Quora model) rather than me making an account. What does Twitter offer me? All it is is a bunch of crappy, one-or-two sentence long comments with the occasional person taking screenshots of text whenever they want to bypass the character-limits. (Alternatively, they make X/46 posts to link tweets together so that they can actually form a cohesive point, but such behavior is better suited for a proper blogpost + Twitter link anyway). Discussion is incredibly shallow and the bulk of the "usefulness" is top-level posts that get reposted to other locations on the internet anyway. Discussion is consistently bad and shallow. Why would I ever want to join Twitter? Reading for points was all I ever did, and only when other people posted Twitter links.
  - blisterpeanuts 3y ago
    I think it depends on the particular discussion. In the pre-acquisition days, there were thousands (probably millions) of automated accounts posting garbage. Many of these have been removed. I recall that when Trump had an active account, his every tweet had a cascade of unbelievably vile, profane responses, incredibly nasty. This type of thing still happens but seems less than before. In more specialized topics such as crypto, technical, pets, etc., discussions seem tamer. But I don't consider Twitter really a place for discussions. It's just a microblogging platform. By the way, the paid tier ("blue check") now allows much longer postings than 280 characters.
    - dragontamer 3y ago
      Twitter could be an absolute heaven of discussion (not that I believe it'd be possible with 280 characters), but unless its open to anonymous users, don't expect me to read it any time soon. 1. I've read it enough over the past years to know what kind of discussion typically takes place on there. I'm glad we both agree that discussion is poor. 2. Blue-checkmarks to be heard better is literally pay-to-be-heard and is not a model I'm particularly fond of. Other pay-to-win structures are similarly anathema to how I want to have discussions with people. 3. Reports from media I trust contradict your opinion. Andrew Tate for example has been getting a lot of news recently, and it has become clear that Elon Musk paid Tate the posting bonus for being a popular guy on Twitter. Is that the kind of person Twitter wants to be elevating on their platform? You make it sound like bots are the problem. What about misogynistic assholes who (pending the results of their current trial) may have led a human trafficking ring? Are these the blue-checkmarks that people are boosting on the platform? There's something to be said about curation. Choosing who, and who does not, get boosted by your algorithms. You're talking about "vile" posts that you are glad are gone. What about Elon Musk's "cisgender" discussion? Is that the kind of stuff you like associating yourself with? 4. Respectable people I trust, such as plainsite, have been banned on Twitter. This is a chilling effect. If people I trust have been banned on Twitter, that lowers the odds of me participating in the discussion, because I know I'll be banned for posting public court documents and otherwise being a reasonable person. The moderation and kinds of people that this new Twitter is going for is definitely in the wrong direction for me. I never wanted Twitter before, but it has taken huge steps away from what I care to align myself with.