Do Other Authors Use Twitter?

[nice90sguy]

Nobody but you and the site know who you ignore (unless of course you tell them). I suspect some might figure it out by how you respond, and who you respond to, depending how clever they are. Some are smarter than others, but the clever bar is set pretty low.

Ok. Thanks.

Not planning on ignoring anyone yet, but I can see its usefulness against haters.

 

[yowser]

Here's an oped about a newspaper reporter banned from twitter (not alone.) The notion of 'free speech' there is highly selective.

 

[lovecraft68]

Here's an oped about a newspaper reporter banned from twitter (not alone.) The notion of 'free speech' there is highly selective.

It always has been, except until Musk it was always okay.
As I said, this is the warning of censorship, you think its great when someone you don't like his censored, but by not speaking out for their rights, you lose yours.
Nothing is happening there now than was before, except all the crazies get to talk and one political faction is no longer considered a protected species.
There's big lessons to be learned here....if one is capable of learning.
1984 has become more prophetic than Nostradamus.

 

[Dr_Strabismus]

1984 has become more prophetic than Nostradamus.

Yeah, but he was out by a few decades. Whereas Nostradamus was bang on the nose when he said

There will appear a shining ornate temple,
the lamp and the candle at Borne and Breteuil.
For the canton of Lucerne turned aside,
when one will see the great cock in his shroud.

 

[lovecraft68]

Yeah, but he was out by a few decades. Whereas Nostradamus was bang on the nose when he said

There will appear a shining ornate temple,
the lamp and the candle at Borne and Breteuil.
For the canton of Lucerne turned aside,
when one will see the great cock in his shroud.

Remember the big Y2K scare?
Case to be made we would have been off if it had come to fruition.

 

[Bramblethorn]

It ought to be pointed out that the information released in the "Twitter files" has been careful curated to create an impression of one sided moderation. In fact, the original report stated that both left wing and right wing content had been treated unfairly, but Musk has released only that information which gives an impression that only the right was victimized.

Uh huh.

Here's the kind of thing that people are getting suspended for under the new "free speech" regime. For context: the "view count" thing is a feature that got added recently, and as with any interface change some people don't like it. The blue tick means that the poster is one of the 0.05% of users who are enthusiastic enough about the new management to pay eight bucks a month for Twitter Blue - but apparently a tongue-in-cheek threat to draw a not very good portrait of Elon is "hateful conduct" these days.

 

[Bramblethorn]

Take a good look at social media and American Society, then get back to me. It takes two sides to completely and irreparably divide an entire nation, and that's where we are.

For a very long time, the standard response to husbands beating their wives was to say "it takes two to have an argument".

Only a fool completely trusts one party, one religion, one ideology and one side of a story.

I agree, and that's why I don't get how you keep on getting suckered by fake stories like the one you just shared.

 

[jsmiam]

…

I agree, and that's why I don't get how you keep on getting suckered by fake stories like the one you just shared.

Owwwwwwwwwwchhh

Bramblethorn 1
Lovecraft 0

Cmon lovecraft. Do the honorable thing. Congratulate bramblethorn. you lost this one. It is done.

And somewhere in there is the old you that people remember. You were feisty then too, but you didn’t sound crazy. what the hell happened?

Tough love: You realize there are at least some new forum members who don’t know the old you who are reading this thread, and it’s you, not tilan they’re talking about as the crazy one, right? A Dissociative personality disordered, NPD grandiosity suffering bipolar delusionary loon singing “they’re coming to take me away, ha ha”, and you sound crazier than him? come back from where you’ve been.

 

[AlinaX]

You do realise he's doing it all just to wind me up.

 

[Bramblethorn]

Owwwwwwwwwwchhh

Bramblethorn 1
Lovecraft 0

That's not what this is, though.

I've known LC for a long time. We've had our ups and downs - I don't think he's going to be offended if I say that he's not the easiest person in the world to get along with - but there's a reason I put in the effort. He and I get angry about a lot of the same things, even if we have different ways of dealing with that anger and different interpretations of what's driving the problems we agree about.

A discussion like this is less like trying to win money off somebody at the poker table, and more like trying to talk a family member out of being swindled by a Nigerian prince.

 

[AwkwardlySet]

I haven't been here long and I have seen some overly aggressive reactions from some people, LC included, but this time I'd say he is the reasonable one. You are idealizing the Twitter before Elon and criticizing the new Twitter. Your criticism stands I'd say, but it was just as much of a shit show before Elon, just for a different side and your lack of criticism for what it was before is what makes your approach one-sided and biased.

 

[AwkwardlySet]

I wouldn't hold my breath. Elon Musk is just another egomaniac drunk with power and fame, and whether we want to face it or not, Twitter will not change until we change. I have never seen a government, media or organization that is not a faithful reflection of its people. If Twitter is such a gutter, that's because its users made it so. Some people are just too afraid to admit it and would rather blame it on egomaniacs like Elon, Trump and such. Mirror Mirror mine...

 

[jsmiam]

That's not what this is, though.

I will admit my outburst may have some cough medicine influences.

 

[Bramblethorn]

I haven't been here long and I have seen some overly aggressive reactions from some people, LC included, but this time I'd say he is the reasonable one. You are idealizing the Twitter before Elon and criticizing the new Twitter. Your criticism stands I'd say, but it was just as much of a shit show before Elon, just for a different side and your lack of criticism for what it was before is what makes your approach one-sided and biased.

Maybe try reading what I actually said about pre-Elon Twitter, less than 24 hours ago, in this very thread:

Twitter's moderation has always been problematic - AFAICT they simply didn't put enough resources into content moderation to have a human make a considered decision about every issue that came up, so it often seemed to come down to how many people reported a post than to whether it actually violated their stated policies.

 

[AwkwardlySet]

My friend, if your criticism is that they didn't have enough moderators, then I don't even know what to tell you. Twitter has been a place where everyone who didn't adhere to some mainstream dogma has been bullied ruthlessly. I don't know if it is possible to hire enough moderators to supervise so many people, and even if it was possible I don't believe they would do their job properly but they would rather go with the flow. It takes balls to stand up against majority and the old Twitter didn't have them, just as the new one doesn't. All mainstream media are the same more or less...

 

[MelissaBaby]

I'm just really impressed that so many people who don't use Twitter somehow know more about it than people who do.

 

[Bramblethorn]

My friend, if your criticism is that they didn't have enough moderators, then I don't even know what to tell you.

The answer to that depends on what you want out of this conversation. If what you want here is merely to repeat assertions that agree with your beliefs and to chant "woke" like it means something more than a vaguely-defined bogeyman under the bed, then you can just go on repeating the things you've been saying and there's no need for you to address me at all.

OTOH, if what you want is to change my point of view on these topics - or to persuade others here - you might consider (1) reading through what's already been discussed in this thread, and then (2) offering evidence for the things you want other people to believe. As Melissa's suggested, "I don't use the site but I know better than people who do" isn't a very persuasive line; concrete verifiable examples will get you much further.

I've already put quite a bit of time into digging up sources to back up the things I've said in this thread, and at this point I'm getting to the point where I start asking myself "hey, why should I be the one doing all the work here?" I'm happy to play research assistant for people who are paying for my time, but otherwise if you want to be taken seriously I'm going to need to see some sign that you're making a bit of effort on this.

For instance, instead of making blustery dismissive noises about my "not enough" moderators comment, you could have done something like this:

- look up how many staff Twitter was employing on moderation in the last few years
- compare that to other major social media companies to put that into perspective
- look up how many users and how much traffic Twitter gets
- use that to make an informed estimate of workload per moderator per day, and provide some reasoned discussion on whether that's a reasonable or unreasonable workload.

For bonus points you could also look into things like the level of training provided to moderators and their experience vs. the complexity of the rules they need to administer (e.g. accounts based in Germany are subject to different laws from those based in the USA, which affects how they're moderated), and into how that workforce and workload are fragmented across different languages/cultures/etc. - e.g. an American mod who speaks perfect English might still not understand what it means to encourage an Australian politician to go for a nice swim at Cheviot Beach).

But you didn't, so here we are with me not taking you seriously. It's in your power to change that, or not, as you choose.

Twitter has been a place where everyone who didn't adhere to some mainstream dogma has been bullied ruthlessly. I don't know if it is possible to hire enough moderators to supervise so many people,

An excellent question! One that might have been worth considering before pooh-pooing the idea that they didn't have enough. If you haven't even looked into that kind of thing, perhaps it's a bit premature to be asserting expertise on how Twitter works.

and even if it was possible I don't believe they would do their job properly but they would rather go with the flow. It takes balls to stand up against majority and the old Twitter didn't have them, just as the new one doesn't. All mainstream media are the same more or less...

All media (including the mainstream and most definitely the fringe) are imperfect. You can choose whether to learn the nature of those imperfections, figure out ways to fact-check what you see and hear in them, and get towards at least a reasonable, defensible approximation of the truth.

Or you can decide that it's all too much effort and chant "fake news" any time you're confronted with something that doesn't agree with your ideas about how the world works. Again, the choice is yours.

 

[AwkwardlySet]

I don't use Twitter and what that means is that I don't have an actual Twitter account. I do get links, daily, from people who do have an account and I follow and read those links and then discuss the posts with those same people. Maybe I should have written "I don't have a Twitter account" instead, maybe that would have prevented the assumptions that because I said what I said, somehow I don't have a clue about Twitter trends. If you are going to use that same argument, then by your own logic of bringing facts to this discussion, please give me some data that shows how active you are and how much time you spend on Twitter. I think that some of you who brought this up have stated that they are barely active there? I might be wrong though. Still, it makes sense that those who spend a lot of time on Twitter know much more than those who only check it occasionally, right? Let's start another discriminating trend.

To Bramblethorn specifically. I didn't pooh-pooh your idea that Twitter doesn't have enough moderators, I actually assumed it is a truthful statement, even though I didn't check that fact. Being an engineer myself, I can understand the need for critical thinking, but I am hardly going to contest every such statement made here. I choose to believe you are not trying to deceive me or anyone else here when saying things that can be fact-checked. Maybe that is lazy from me, but hey, this is a fun forum. What I did criticize you for is practically saying that the only problem with "old" Twitter was not enough moderators. You specifically quoted that part of your earlier post as a proof you DID criticize the "old" Twitter. And I am merely saying, once again, there is far more wrong with Old Twitter than the lack of moderators. Twitter's problem, same as with any other social network, are its users. They are creating the gutter, the bullying, the vilest forms of attacks, all done from the safety of their computer chairs. Same as every other social network, Twitter is meant to be profitable, which means its owners will want as many users as possible, which means they will not do anything to antagonize the majority of users, no matter if it's right or wrong. So what I was saying is that hiring more moderators wouldn't really change that much, because the profitability of Twitter is its true barrier of becoming a decent place.

On your last remark, I will just say that we probably have very different perspectives. Living where I live, I was able to see with my own eyes those "Fake News" coming from largest media houses in the world. They are all just painting the picture according to their agendas and interests. It's not like you can actually fact-check what is really happening in some remote part of the world, right? Although, honestly I don't know why you brought up the subject. I have never said anything about Fake News on Twitter or any other media in previous posts. The whole damn time I am only talking about the nature of "discussions" on Twitter, old and new : the vile discourse, the name-calling, threats and such. And it will never stop, because the basic premises I mentioned above will never change.

 

[theWollstonecraftWoman]

I'm not a twit, and I don't tweet, so no authority to make comments on the Twitter world state of affairs.

 

[AH_Mod]

This thread is going nowhere positive in a hurry, and at the request of the OP, I'm going to lock it now.

Tilan, you're sitting on the edge of a recommendation for a 24 hour forum ban, followed by bans of escalating length if you don't cease the personal attacks and trolling.