6 ms·

I guess I don't quite understand the controversy. To my knowledge twitter never claimed these were legitimate tweets, and they certainly looked contrived. Who i

by duaneb 13y ago

I guess I don't quite understand the controversy. To my knowledge twitter never claimed these were legitimate tweets, and they certainly looked contrived. Who is getting fooled here and at what harm? This strikes me as typical silicon valley gossip news—ultimately worthless except to drive people to news aggregators and the offending sites. I even went on twitter for the first time in a month!

dllthomas 13y ago
The fact they were associated with real twitter accounts seems sketchy.
- nadaviv 13y ago
  I would see how it could be a mistake; almost any username the designer would make up is likely to be a real username.
  - philwebster 13y ago
    Yes, but they also used someone's profile picture, so I don't think that was the issue.
    - blowski 13y ago
      Even so, this seems like outrage for the sake of outrage. Did the users suffer any kind of harm whatsoever?
      - dllthomas 13y ago
        They weren't paid for their endorsement.
        blowski 13y ago
        It's like being focused on at a football match. They didn't 'endorse' the match or the broadcaster, and it seems like most people love their 5 seconds of fame.
        dllthomas 13y ago
        That's different because they showed up at the football match, and that's all that's being relayed. They didn't endorse the match or the broadcaster, but we're also not being told they did - which is what the fake tweets are doing. “This @baristabar ad is giving me the coffee shakes. Looks so good!” “I wish I could make fancy lattes like in the @barristabar commercial,” “What is the song in the new @baristabar commercial? I love it!”
        blowski 13y ago
        Barista Bar is fake so they're not endorsing anything really. I agree that it's a mistake on Twitter's part, but it doesn't seem malicious or serious. Public accounts and photos have got a bit more publicity than they expected.
        dllthomas 13y ago
        No, it doesn't sound malicious or serious. Article is worthwhile almost exclusively as a "hey, don't do this"
        eli 13y ago
        Is it still an endorsement if the thing they're endorsing doesn't exist?
        duaneb 13y ago
        They didn't even endorse a real company....
      - potatolicious 13y ago
        Real harm would be hard to prove, but this is deeply unprofessional on Twitter's part. You could probably make a case for implied endorsement, and maybe even win, but that seems besides the point. This would be like a Google commercial featuring "blowski, Google User" in one part. There's no real harm to you, and you are a Google user (I assume), but you've been publicized in a massive way that you never consented to. People do not appreciate being thrust into the limelight suddenly and without warning. This isn't a huge outrage, but it does suggest some process failure on Twitter's part. You never, ever, ever, ever, ever mock up designs with real user data. This looks like what happened here - someone thoughtlessly used the username and profile pic in a mockup, which eventually made its way to PR without verification. There are some poor processes in Twitter's design department, evidently. Hopefully they'll learn from this. Never mock up designs with real data. Twitter should have a reserve of handles/profiles they actually own for marketing uses.
        ampersandy 13y ago
        Most feature launches that need a 'scapegoat' use employees' likenesses or profiles. For example: - the 'Twitter Teacher' who appears in the sign up flow used to work at Twitter; - and, the profiles used in the verification flow are also employees (http://dashes.com/anil/2013/03/what-its-like-being-verified-on-twitter.html http://dashes.com/anil/2013/03/what-its-like-being-verified-...). I agree that this was unprofessional though and hope the offenders learn from the mistake.
        duaneb 13y ago
        > deeply unprofessional on Twitter's part. Agreed, but 'deeply unprofessional' should not imply hysteria. Worst case scenario, someone thinks their friend likes a coffee shop that does not exist.
        dllthomas 13y ago
        I agree that hysteria would be an inappropriate response.
      - deleted 13y ago
        [deleted]
philwebster 13y ago
The problem is that Twitter was using real user accounts with made-up tweets. It's ok to make up tweets for the demo, but they should have also used fake accounts.
- notatoad 13y ago
  Yeah, they should have used fake accounts. but it's not a huge deal. "Twitter caught using real user's handles in advertising mockup" is much less of a story than "twitter caught faking users tweets".
ctdonath 13y ago
duaneb 2 hours ago | link Oh, I get it now. Putting putting words in people's virtual mouths without their permission or knowledge, then using it for advertising purposes, isn't such a good idea after all.
- kghose 13y ago
  LOL. That is an insightful (and Hillarious!) comment. I knew something was wrong right away, but it took me a moment to figure out what!
strathmeyer 13y ago
Maybe you should ask a hacker and they could explain the controversy to you? Or maybe just ask a decent human being?
coldtea 13y ago
>I guess I don't quite understand the controversy. To my knowledge twitter never claimed these were legitimate tweets Thinking they are legitimate is the DEFAULT expectation. The only way for them to not claim they are legitimate tweets is to actually state, visibly, that they are NOT legitimate. And that's without even taking into account that they used REAL account names. >Who is getting fooled here and at what harm? Who the fuck told Twitter that I, as a user, want my REAL ACCOUNT HANDLE, advertising stuff I don't know about?
- alex_c 13y ago
  >Thinking they are legitimate is the DEFAULT expectation. Not if you're looking at a mockup in an ad. Quite the opposite, actually.
  - d23 13y ago
    If they hadn't used real users' names, I'd be inclined to agree. But they did, and I'm not.
    - alex_c 13y ago
      Still disagree - when I see a mockup like that I assume it's all fake, including the user names. The surprising part isn't that the tweets are fake, but that the usernames are real.
      - dllthomas 13y ago
        I agree that my default assumption would be that all the data was made up. If I saw a handle and photo of someone I knew, though, I'd probably assume the rest of that tweet was genuine as well.
- duaneb 13y ago
  > Thinking they are legitimate is the DEFAULT expectation. Maybe for someone who has never viewed an ad before (which almost entirely exist in hypothetical universes, aka fictional), but it's clearly marketing speak and not someone's actual writing.
lnanek2 13y ago
So someone could take a screenshot of your post, put their own text in the body instead of yours, show it to millions of people, and you wouldn't mind? What company do you hate most? Microsoft? Google? So you wouldn't mind if we changed the text of your post to support them and showed your username to everyone as loving the company? And stuck your picture next to it as well? I'm mostly pissed off because the laws against using likeness/pictures/etc. to promote products without model sign off get in my way myself all the time, so seeing Twitter break the laws I have to follow is very annoying.

by duaneb 13y ago

dllthomas 13y ago

The fact they were associated with real twitter accounts seems sketchy.

nadaviv 13y ago
I would see how it could be a mistake; almost any username the designer would make up is likely to be a real username.
- philwebster 13y ago
  Yes, but they also used someone's profile picture, so I don't think that was the issue.
  - blowski 13y ago
    Even so, this seems like outrage for the sake of outrage. Did the users suffer any kind of harm whatsoever?
    - dllthomas 13y ago
      They weren't paid for their endorsement.
      - blowski 13y ago
        It's like being focused on at a football match. They didn't 'endorse' the match or the broadcaster, and it seems like most people love their 5 seconds of fame.
        dllthomas 13y ago
        That's different because they showed up at the football match, and that's all that's being relayed. They didn't endorse the match or the broadcaster, but we're also not being told they did - which is what the fake tweets are doing. “This @baristabar ad is giving me the coffee shakes. Looks so good!” “I wish I could make fancy lattes like in the @barristabar commercial,” “What is the song in the new @baristabar commercial? I love it!”
        blowski 13y ago
        Barista Bar is fake so they're not endorsing anything really. I agree that it's a mistake on Twitter's part, but it doesn't seem malicious or serious. Public accounts and photos have got a bit more publicity than they expected.
        dllthomas 13y ago
        No, it doesn't sound malicious or serious. Article is worthwhile almost exclusively as a "hey, don't do this"
      - eli 13y ago
        Is it still an endorsement if the thing they're endorsing doesn't exist?
      - duaneb 13y ago
        They didn't even endorse a real company....
    - potatolicious 13y ago
      Real harm would be hard to prove, but this is deeply unprofessional on Twitter's part. You could probably make a case for implied endorsement, and maybe even win, but that seems besides the point. This would be like a Google commercial featuring "blowski, Google User" in one part. There's no real harm to you, and you are a Google user (I assume), but you've been publicized in a massive way that you never consented to. People do not appreciate being thrust into the limelight suddenly and without warning. This isn't a huge outrage, but it does suggest some process failure on Twitter's part. You never, ever, ever, ever, ever mock up designs with real user data. This looks like what happened here - someone thoughtlessly used the username and profile pic in a mockup, which eventually made its way to PR without verification. There are some poor processes in Twitter's design department, evidently. Hopefully they'll learn from this. Never mock up designs with real data. Twitter should have a reserve of handles/profiles they actually own for marketing uses.
      - ampersandy 13y ago
        Most feature launches that need a 'scapegoat' use employees' likenesses or profiles. For example: - the 'Twitter Teacher' who appears in the sign up flow used to work at Twitter; - and, the profiles used in the verification flow are also employees (http://dashes.com/anil/2013/03/what-its-like-being-verified-on-twitter.html http://dashes.com/anil/2013/03/what-its-like-being-verified-...). I agree that this was unprofessional though and hope the offenders learn from the mistake.
      - duaneb 13y ago
        > deeply unprofessional on Twitter's part. Agreed, but 'deeply unprofessional' should not imply hysteria. Worst case scenario, someone thinks their friend likes a coffee shop that does not exist.
        dllthomas 13y ago
        I agree that hysteria would be an inappropriate response.
    - deleted 13y ago
      [deleted]

philwebster 13y ago

The problem is that Twitter was using real user accounts with made-up tweets. It's ok to make up tweets for the demo, but they should have also used fake accounts.

notatoad 13y ago
Yeah, they should have used fake accounts. but it's not a huge deal. "Twitter caught using real user's handles in advertising mockup" is much less of a story than "twitter caught faking users tweets".

ctdonath 13y ago

duaneb 2 hours ago | link Oh, I get it now. Putting putting words in people's virtual mouths without their permission or knowledge, then using it for advertising purposes, isn't such a good idea after all.

kghose 13y ago
LOL. That is an insightful (and Hillarious!) comment. I knew something was wrong right away, but it took me a moment to figure out what!

strathmeyer 13y ago

Maybe you should ask a hacker and they could explain the controversy to you? Or maybe just ask a decent human being?

coldtea 13y ago

>I guess I don't quite understand the controversy. To my knowledge twitter never claimed these were legitimate tweets Thinking they are legitimate is the DEFAULT expectation. The only way for them to not claim they are legitimate tweets is to actually state, visibly, that they are NOT legitimate. And that's without even taking into account that they used REAL account names. >Who is getting fooled here and at what harm? Who the fuck told Twitter that I, as a user, want my REAL ACCOUNT HANDLE, advertising stuff I don't know about?

alex_c 13y ago
>Thinking they are legitimate is the DEFAULT expectation. Not if you're looking at a mockup in an ad. Quite the opposite, actually.
- d23 13y ago
  If they hadn't used real users' names, I'd be inclined to agree. But they did, and I'm not.
  - alex_c 13y ago
    Still disagree - when I see a mockup like that I assume it's all fake, including the user names. The surprising part isn't that the tweets are fake, but that the usernames are real.
    - dllthomas 13y ago
      I agree that my default assumption would be that all the data was made up. If I saw a handle and photo of someone I knew, though, I'd probably assume the rest of that tweet was genuine as well.
duaneb 13y ago
> Thinking they are legitimate is the DEFAULT expectation. Maybe for someone who has never viewed an ad before (which almost entirely exist in hypothetical universes, aka fictional), but it's clearly marketing speak and not someone's actual writing.

lnanek2 13y ago

So someone could take a screenshot of your post, put their own text in the body instead of yours, show it to millions of people, and you wouldn't mind? What company do you hate most? Microsoft? Google? So you wouldn't mind if we changed the text of your post to support them and showed your username to everyone as loving the company? And stuck your picture next to it as well? I'm mostly pissed off because the laws against using likeness/pictures/etc. to promote products without model sign off get in my way myself all the time, so seeing Twitter break the laws I have to follow is very annoying.