5 ms·

"Death of Twitter" why are people so deluded and so eager for Twitter to fail? You were a big fan of the previous regime's censorship?

Retr0id 3y ago
"Twitter Has Complied With Almost Every Government Request For Censorship Since Musk Took Over, Report Finds" - https://www.forbes.com/sites/katherinehamilton/2023/04/27/twitter-has-complied-with-almost-every-government-request-for-censorship-since-musk-took-over-report-finds/ https://www.forbes.com/sites/katherinehamilton/2023/04/27/tw...
- the_doctah 3y ago
  Do you think it is more or less censored than before?
  - JohnFen 3y ago
    If that Forbes article is correct, then it's about the same amount of censorship as before.
    - the_doctah 3y ago
      That implies government requests were the sole source of Twitter's censorship.
      - JohnFen 3y ago
        Yes indeed. It's only "censorship" when the government demands it. Engaging in voluntary moderation is not censorship in a meaningful sense. It is, in fact, an aspect of freedom of speech that people should not be compelled to engage in speech that they don't want to engage in.
        the_doctah 3y ago
        I don't agree with your definition of censorship. A government doesn't have to be involved to qualify. Moderation is a subset of censorship.
        JohnFen 3y ago
        Strictly speaking, you're correct -- but it also highlights that not all censorship is wrong or bad. It can very easily be a valid exercise of free speech rights. Twitter (or any social media) moderating people's posts isn't wrong, for instance. Nobody's rights are being infringed when they do this. You might disagree with their moderation policies, but that's a different thing altogether. Legally speaking in the US, it's only censorship when the government is doing it.
        briantakita 3y ago
        It's government censorship when the government is involved with funding the companies doing the censoring or when the FBI "nudges" companies to suppress stories. Having spooks in executive positions doesn't help the optics either. If anything, a bunch of companies acting in lock step to suppress certain stories or opinions should face anti-trust scrutiny...assuming we have a functioning justice system. The government outsourcing censorship to private corporations is government censorship...
        swayvil 3y ago
        That's some fine semantic tapdancing.
      - inopinatus 3y ago
        Fair point; for example, I'm now self-censoring on Twitter since it become overrun with toxic arseholes after October 2022.
  - stefan_ 3y ago
    Huh? It is now vastly more censored - everyone who isn't paying for the blue check is essentially shadowbanned, while "conversations" are dominated by ChatGPT reply bots and grifters.
- vGPU 3y ago
  > Forbes reached out to Twitter for comment, and received an automated poop emoji, which the company has been using to respond to press requests for at least a month. You gotta admit, the kind of shenanigans Musk pulls are hilarious. The definition of F-U money.
  - balder1991 3y ago
    To me this sort of thing makes it feel like a high school kid took over Twitter.
- zo1 3y ago
  Call me when we've had a verified audit and report and detailed breakdown of all censorship. I want database dumps, SQL statements, verifiable guids and URLs, etc. Until then that's just a grey blob of hearsay and may very well be "true" but doesn't represent reality. We need to see the raw data.
  - frabbit 3y ago
    Failing that it is probably worth listening-to/reading Matt Taibbi: https://twitterfiles.substack.com/p/the-censorship-industrial-complex https://twitterfiles.substack.com/p/the-censorship-industria... https://public.substack.com/p/censorship-leaders-accuse-us-of-antisemitism https://public.substack.com/p/censorship-leaders-accuse-us-o...
    - Kbelicius 3y ago
      > Failing that it is probably worth listening-to/reading Matt Taibbi: No it is not. https://www.thedailybeast.com/msnbc-host-mehdi-hasan-makes-matt-taibbi-squirm-over-his-twitter-files-errors https://www.thedailybeast.com/msnbc-host-mehdi-hasan-makes-m...
      - frabbit 3y ago
        I'm surprised that someone as interested in this as you has not followed up to try and see whether Taibbi's worrying thesis has any merit. He, and Shellenberger and the other writers at "Public" are slowly revealing the outlines of something disturbing. Namely that social media companies take the direction of state surveillance and espionage actors -- including those of foreign (Israeli and Ukrainian secret services) governments, currently considered allies. This is being revealed to be effected through a sinister network of supposed "civil society" NGOs and 501c3s. That's a worrying idea to anyone that considers themself a democrat or a republican (in the non-partisan sense). If you had followed up on this you would have noticed that although Taibbi rapidly admitted conflating CISA and CIS a further look suggests that the CIS is deeply inter-twined with the DHS and that Taibbi was correct about the CISA's involvement with the EIP. Taibbi is good at admitting his errors and correcting them publicly and rapidly: https://www.racket.news/p/lee-fang-vs-mehdi-hasan-round-2 https://www.racket.news/p/lee-fang-vs-mehdi-hasan-round-2 With regard to the 22 million versus 3000 , Taibbi's co-author Michael Shellenberger notes that: https://public.substack.com/p/attack-of-the-censorship-karens https://public.substack.com/p/attack-of-the-censorship-karen... “Stamos & EIP worked to get entire NARRATIVES banned outright,” explained Mike Benz, the State Department official-turned-whistleblower. “Those narratives, by EIP’s own math, had millions of associated posts.” Taibbi pointed out that the 3,000 number was chosen to hide the full extent of the censorship. “They're playing games with terms like ‘unique original URL,’” tweeted Taibbi, “where more than 1000 tweets can be "collapsed" into one ‘incident.’” Here’s the thing: it doesn’t matter how many posts they censored. No amount is acceptable. Again, as stated in my original response to this: yes, the full dump would be ideal, but it is definitely worth considering what Taibbi says. If he's right this needs to be stopped now, if he's wrong then trying to safeguard against the massive abuses and manipulation will not cause harm.
JohnFen 3y ago
Twitter was a dumpster fire before Musk, but Musk has decided to pour gasoline in that dumpster. I don't care if Twitter succeeds or fails, but I think that if the media and other entities stop using Twitter as their sole method of communication, that can only be a great thing for everybody. If people stopped using Twitter as a source for reporting, that would also be a great thing. Twitter is a unique world, not representative of the larger world.
- itronitron 3y ago
  Twitter has been a fidget spinner for journalists.
segasaturn 3y ago
I've never been a Twitter user, never have and never will, so I can't comment on whatever the previous regime was doing, but I see people talking about Twitter much less than they did a year ago, which is kind of what the headline article is about.
- staunton 3y ago
  Being same as you in terms of Twitter use, I see people talk about it a lot more now (mostly discussing the sudden quirky changes).
karaterobot 3y ago
I'm eager for Twitter to fail because I think it's been a net negative influence on the world almost since its inception, but it has not seemed realistic to hope that it could go away until now. Certainly, it will be replaced by something, and that thing may be just as bad, but I'm happy for the possibility that it might be better too.
- itronitron 3y ago
  I recall reading an article about the genesis of Twitter, and it included one of the tweets from one of the founders who was tweeting 'just had Ethiopian for dinner' or something like that. My response to that, and to every tweet ever since has been, "yeah, I don't give a shit."
  - idontpost 3y ago
    [dead]
dj_gitmo 3y ago
There was some data that suggested twitter was already in a decline before Musk. People have just been souring on social media in general.

Retr0id 3y ago

"Twitter Has Complied With Almost Every Government Request For Censorship Since Musk Took Over, Report Finds" - https://www.forbes.com/sites/katherinehamilton/2023/04/27/twitter-has-complied-with-almost-every-government-request-for-censorship-since-musk-took-over-report-finds/ https://www.forbes.com/sites/katherinehamilton/2023/04/27/tw...

the_doctah 3y ago
Do you think it is more or less censored than before?
- JohnFen 3y ago
  If that Forbes article is correct, then it's about the same amount of censorship as before.
  - the_doctah 3y ago
    That implies government requests were the sole source of Twitter's censorship.
    - JohnFen 3y ago
      Yes indeed. It's only "censorship" when the government demands it. Engaging in voluntary moderation is not censorship in a meaningful sense. It is, in fact, an aspect of freedom of speech that people should not be compelled to engage in speech that they don't want to engage in.
      - the_doctah 3y ago
        I don't agree with your definition of censorship. A government doesn't have to be involved to qualify. Moderation is a subset of censorship.
        JohnFen 3y ago
        Strictly speaking, you're correct -- but it also highlights that not all censorship is wrong or bad. It can very easily be a valid exercise of free speech rights. Twitter (or any social media) moderating people's posts isn't wrong, for instance. Nobody's rights are being infringed when they do this. You might disagree with their moderation policies, but that's a different thing altogether. Legally speaking in the US, it's only censorship when the government is doing it.
        briantakita 3y ago
        It's government censorship when the government is involved with funding the companies doing the censoring or when the FBI "nudges" companies to suppress stories. Having spooks in executive positions doesn't help the optics either. If anything, a bunch of companies acting in lock step to suppress certain stories or opinions should face anti-trust scrutiny...assuming we have a functioning justice system. The government outsourcing censorship to private corporations is government censorship...
      - swayvil 3y ago
        That's some fine semantic tapdancing.
    - inopinatus 3y ago
      Fair point; for example, I'm now self-censoring on Twitter since it become overrun with toxic arseholes after October 2022.
- stefan_ 3y ago
  Huh? It is now vastly more censored - everyone who isn't paying for the blue check is essentially shadowbanned, while "conversations" are dominated by ChatGPT reply bots and grifters.
vGPU 3y ago
> Forbes reached out to Twitter for comment, and received an automated poop emoji, which the company has been using to respond to press requests for at least a month. You gotta admit, the kind of shenanigans Musk pulls are hilarious. The definition of F-U money.
- balder1991 3y ago
  To me this sort of thing makes it feel like a high school kid took over Twitter.
zo1 3y ago
Call me when we've had a verified audit and report and detailed breakdown of all censorship. I want database dumps, SQL statements, verifiable guids and URLs, etc. Until then that's just a grey blob of hearsay and may very well be "true" but doesn't represent reality. We need to see the raw data.
- frabbit 3y ago
  Failing that it is probably worth listening-to/reading Matt Taibbi: https://twitterfiles.substack.com/p/the-censorship-industrial-complex https://twitterfiles.substack.com/p/the-censorship-industria... https://public.substack.com/p/censorship-leaders-accuse-us-of-antisemitism https://public.substack.com/p/censorship-leaders-accuse-us-o...
  - Kbelicius 3y ago
    > Failing that it is probably worth listening-to/reading Matt Taibbi: No it is not. https://www.thedailybeast.com/msnbc-host-mehdi-hasan-makes-matt-taibbi-squirm-over-his-twitter-files-errors https://www.thedailybeast.com/msnbc-host-mehdi-hasan-makes-m...
    - frabbit 3y ago
      I'm surprised that someone as interested in this as you has not followed up to try and see whether Taibbi's worrying thesis has any merit. He, and Shellenberger and the other writers at "Public" are slowly revealing the outlines of something disturbing. Namely that social media companies take the direction of state surveillance and espionage actors -- including those of foreign (Israeli and Ukrainian secret services) governments, currently considered allies. This is being revealed to be effected through a sinister network of supposed "civil society" NGOs and 501c3s. That's a worrying idea to anyone that considers themself a democrat or a republican (in the non-partisan sense). If you had followed up on this you would have noticed that although Taibbi rapidly admitted conflating CISA and CIS a further look suggests that the CIS is deeply inter-twined with the DHS and that Taibbi was correct about the CISA's involvement with the EIP. Taibbi is good at admitting his errors and correcting them publicly and rapidly: https://www.racket.news/p/lee-fang-vs-mehdi-hasan-round-2 https://www.racket.news/p/lee-fang-vs-mehdi-hasan-round-2 With regard to the 22 million versus 3000 , Taibbi's co-author Michael Shellenberger notes that: https://public.substack.com/p/attack-of-the-censorship-karens https://public.substack.com/p/attack-of-the-censorship-karen... “Stamos & EIP worked to get entire NARRATIVES banned outright,” explained Mike Benz, the State Department official-turned-whistleblower. “Those narratives, by EIP’s own math, had millions of associated posts.” Taibbi pointed out that the 3,000 number was chosen to hide the full extent of the censorship. “They're playing games with terms like ‘unique original URL,’” tweeted Taibbi, “where more than 1000 tweets can be "collapsed" into one ‘incident.’” Here’s the thing: it doesn’t matter how many posts they censored. No amount is acceptable. Again, as stated in my original response to this: yes, the full dump would be ideal, but it is definitely worth considering what Taibbi says. If he's right this needs to be stopped now, if he's wrong then trying to safeguard against the massive abuses and manipulation will not cause harm.

JohnFen 3y ago

Twitter was a dumpster fire before Musk, but Musk has decided to pour gasoline in that dumpster. I don't care if Twitter succeeds or fails, but I think that if the media and other entities stop using Twitter as their sole method of communication, that can only be a great thing for everybody. If people stopped using Twitter as a source for reporting, that would also be a great thing. Twitter is a unique world, not representative of the larger world.

itronitron 3y ago
Twitter has been a fidget spinner for journalists.

segasaturn 3y ago

I've never been a Twitter user, never have and never will, so I can't comment on whatever the previous regime was doing, but I see people talking about Twitter much less than they did a year ago, which is kind of what the headline article is about.

staunton 3y ago
Being same as you in terms of Twitter use, I see people talk about it a lot more now (mostly discussing the sudden quirky changes).

karaterobot 3y ago

I'm eager for Twitter to fail because I think it's been a net negative influence on the world almost since its inception, but it has not seemed realistic to hope that it could go away until now. Certainly, it will be replaced by something, and that thing may be just as bad, but I'm happy for the possibility that it might be better too.

itronitron 3y ago
I recall reading an article about the genesis of Twitter, and it included one of the tweets from one of the founders who was tweeting 'just had Ethiopian for dinner' or something like that. My response to that, and to every tweet ever since has been, "yeah, I don't give a shit."
- idontpost 3y ago
  [dead]

dj_gitmo 3y ago

There was some data that suggested twitter was already in a decline before Musk. People have just been souring on social media in general.