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X Kicked Off 2024 by Screwing Up During Japan's Earthquake Emergency

20 points by cf100clunk 3y ago

nradov 3y ago
This is a total nothingburger. No reasonable person should expect timely or accurate information about a current event on any social media platform. It's weird for Vice to try to make this into a story.
- deleted 3y ago
  [deleted]
- delecti 3y ago
  For most of Twitter's existence, it was a fantastic source of real-time information about rapidly-changing events. Many organizations used it to distribute urgent information, and it was totally reasonable for users to rely on that.
  - nradov 3y ago
    I can't imagine the level of leadership incompetence in any organization that would rely on Twitter to distribute urgent information. Seriously wtf?
    - happytoexplain 3y ago
      "Rely" implies they don't use multiple vectors. Regardless, Twitter was historically reliable for the purpose of being one vector - a particularly functional one, in fact. You're making exaggerated attacks.
    - delecti 3y ago
      In your eagerness to hate on everything Twitter ever was, and not just what it has become, you are ignoring that Twitter was a fantastic resource for that kind of thing for over a decade. It's not incompetence to use a free tool that is so well suited for the job. And as the other reply mentioned, this wasn't the only way they were distributing information. In the tweet where the NERV announced they were being rate limited, they also linked to their dedicated app.
      - nradov 3y ago
        You misunderstand. I don't hate Twitter/X. I've used it since near the beginning and continue to use it today. It's a useful tool for some purposes. But it was never a reliable channel for distributing urgent information. It has always been highly unreliable for a wide range of reasons.
        orwin 3y ago
        It was used as that though, I was in Paris during both Charlie Hebdo (close to one of a student i worked with lived) and during the Bataclan (family member was working at the football game where the secondary attack attempt took place). SMS and calls were overloaded, i didn't have any social media account, so Facebook was out for me, twitter was the only place i got news. Now, i don't think i would even consider using it though. Mainly because you have to create an account, but also i think the quality degraded since Covid and i can't check if its becomming better (nitter tells me it isn't though).
    - rsynnott 3y ago
      Eh, back when Twitter actually worked properly (essentially from the end of the failwhale era to the ascension of Carface) it was… kind of fine for that purpose? Became particularly popular for it in Japan.
- happytoexplain 3y ago
  Having lots of garbage information is not the same thing as not having useful information. Lots of reasonable people are used to being able to find timely and accurate information via Twitter (either from accounts belonging to first-hand sources, from accounts belonging to sources the user trusts, or via links to one of those). You may argue that they shouldn't, or no-true-Scotsman the definition of a "reasonable" person, but the simple reality is that Twitter historically earned that expectation from tons of people. It was the example of a platform, social media or otherwise, that, with a little curation, could produce "timely or accurate information about a current event". It was an exact counter-example to your assertion. Whether it still is, I don't know.
- dekhn 3y ago
  that was a major feature of twitter and people got used to it over the past decade+
- rsynnott 3y ago
  This is, like… one of the things that Twitter was historically quite good for.
oaththrowaway 3y ago
[flagged]
- delecti 3y ago
  That $8 doesn't get you verification, it gets you a blue checkmark and algorithmic boosting. The article is about the fact that a lot of misleading or outright false information is being algorithmically boosted during an emergency situation. To me that seems pretty reasonable to criticize.
  - oaththrowaway 3y ago
    Vice mad it can't afford $8 checkmark and algorithmic boosting. Better?
    - delecti 3y ago
      But that's not accurate either. They've got a business account (gold checkmark), which AFAIK costs even more than $8. https://twitter.com/vice https://twitter.com/vice The problem is that any dumbass can pay $8 and spread algorithmically boosted misinformation. They're using this particular disaster as illustrative of how badly twitter has been ruined as a resource, when it used to be so valuable.
      - oaththrowaway 3y ago
        It was clearly a joke about Vice's finances. Keep downvoting though
        throwaway167 3y ago
        Joking about Vice's finances in a story about X.
        oaththrowaway 3y ago
        Written by...?

20 points by cf100clunk 3y ago

This is a total nothingburger. No reasonable person should expect timely or accurate information about a current event on any social media platform. It's weird for Vice to try to make this into a story.

deleted 3y ago
[deleted]
delecti 3y ago
For most of Twitter's existence, it was a fantastic source of real-time information about rapidly-changing events. Many organizations used it to distribute urgent information, and it was totally reasonable for users to rely on that.
- nradov 3y ago
  I can't imagine the level of leadership incompetence in any organization that would rely on Twitter to distribute urgent information. Seriously wtf?
  - happytoexplain 3y ago
    "Rely" implies they don't use multiple vectors. Regardless, Twitter was historically reliable for the purpose of being one vector - a particularly functional one, in fact. You're making exaggerated attacks.
  - delecti 3y ago
    In your eagerness to hate on everything Twitter ever was, and not just what it has become, you are ignoring that Twitter was a fantastic resource for that kind of thing for over a decade. It's not incompetence to use a free tool that is so well suited for the job. And as the other reply mentioned, this wasn't the only way they were distributing information. In the tweet where the NERV announced they were being rate limited, they also linked to their dedicated app.
    - nradov 3y ago
      You misunderstand. I don't hate Twitter/X. I've used it since near the beginning and continue to use it today. It's a useful tool for some purposes. But it was never a reliable channel for distributing urgent information. It has always been highly unreliable for a wide range of reasons.
      - orwin 3y ago
        It was used as that though, I was in Paris during both Charlie Hebdo (close to one of a student i worked with lived) and during the Bataclan (family member was working at the football game where the secondary attack attempt took place). SMS and calls were overloaded, i didn't have any social media account, so Facebook was out for me, twitter was the only place i got news. Now, i don't think i would even consider using it though. Mainly because you have to create an account, but also i think the quality degraded since Covid and i can't check if its becomming better (nitter tells me it isn't though).
  - rsynnott 3y ago
    Eh, back when Twitter actually worked properly (essentially from the end of the failwhale era to the ascension of Carface) it was… kind of fine for that purpose? Became particularly popular for it in Japan.
happytoexplain 3y ago
Having lots of garbage information is not the same thing as not having useful information. Lots of reasonable people are used to being able to find timely and accurate information via Twitter (either from accounts belonging to first-hand sources, from accounts belonging to sources the user trusts, or via links to one of those). You may argue that they shouldn't, or no-true-Scotsman the definition of a "reasonable" person, but the simple reality is that Twitter historically earned that expectation from tons of people. It was the example of a platform, social media or otherwise, that, with a little curation, could produce "timely or accurate information about a current event". It was an exact counter-example to your assertion. Whether it still is, I don't know.
dekhn 3y ago
that was a major feature of twitter and people got used to it over the past decade+
rsynnott 3y ago
This is, like… one of the things that Twitter was historically quite good for.

oaththrowaway 3y ago

[flagged]

delecti 3y ago
That $8 doesn't get you verification, it gets you a blue checkmark and algorithmic boosting. The article is about the fact that a lot of misleading or outright false information is being algorithmically boosted during an emergency situation. To me that seems pretty reasonable to criticize.
- oaththrowaway 3y ago
  Vice mad it can't afford $8 checkmark and algorithmic boosting. Better?
  - delecti 3y ago
    But that's not accurate either. They've got a business account (gold checkmark), which AFAIK costs even more than $8. https://twitter.com/vice https://twitter.com/vice The problem is that any dumbass can pay $8 and spread algorithmically boosted misinformation. They're using this particular disaster as illustrative of how badly twitter has been ruined as a resource, when it used to be so valuable.
    - oaththrowaway 3y ago
      It was clearly a joke about Vice's finances. Keep downvoting though
      - throwaway167 3y ago
        Joking about Vice's finances in a story about X.
        oaththrowaway 3y ago
        Written by...?