In the last few months Twitter has went from letting you browse the site without signing in, to now prompting you to sign in to do pretty much anything. Even something as simple as scrolling down with my mousewheel in Twitter prompts me to sign in. This also happens with official government communication pages. I thought courts already decided in the US that the public has a right to access official government communications on social media. When requiring users to sign in and agree to the companies terms, wouldn't this be considered a form of preventing access to those communications?
Ask HN: What Has Happened to Twitter?
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Re: Ask HN: What Has Happened to Twitter?
#2Twitter is doing private platform things.
Re: Ask HN: What Has Happened to Twitter?
#3You can read directly linked tweets or the first few posts of a Twitter page but as soon as you interact with the page or try to navigate elsewhere, you get prompted for a login.
So technically they're not preventing access, but they nag you incessantly after you've scrolled past the fold.
Re: Ask HN: What Has Happened to Twitter?
#4> the public has a right to access official government communications on social media.
IANAL, but I do work in the public sector and my customers do have to make data public. This does not mean that anywhere they choose to post links to documents has to help out. It means they need their own site to post documents. It also can mean that documents are offline, but FOIA-able. Frankly, in the small town that I live in, some documents are still tacked to a bulletin board in the park.
So yes, documents have to be public, but no, it is not the responsibility of Twitter to ensure those regulations are met.
That being said, I do agree that Twitter is making "interesting" choices. Just not illegal ones.
Re: Ask HN: What Has Happened to Twitter?
#5Making a Twitter account takes less than a minute to do and is free. It's not a big deal.
Edit: I'm not seeing the issue in an incognito tab.
Re: Ask HN: What Has Happened to Twitter?
#6I assume new CEO, new strategy.
Twitters profitability has always been a contentious issue, they launched their first subscription service (Twitter Blue) last year. My assumption is that they are potentially trying to move towards a more subscription based revenue model. The push back against ads is only going to get stronger and maybe they are trying to get ahead of the curve.
On top of that with GDPR and all the inevitable legislation that's coming, having people "registered" ensures that they have accepted Ts&Cs and can be tracked legally for advertising purposes. Maybe they anticipate not being able to run (particularly) profitable ads for unregistered users.
Finally, with the new CEO he probably wants a quick win on metrics, this could push more registrations, good news to report to the board.
Re: Ask HN: What Has Happened to Twitter?
#7The "uBlock Origin" browser extension blocks Twitter's login prompt and enables you to read posts without logging in.
Re: Ask HN: What Has Happened to Twitter?
#8You can read directly linked tweets or the first few posts of a Twitter page but as soon as you interact with the page or try to navigate elsewhere, you get prompted for a login. So technically they're not preventing access, but they nag you incessantly after you've scrolled past the fold.
“Nagging” could be measured and defined, IMO.
Re: Ask HN: What Has Happened to Twitter?
#9You can read directly linked tweets or the first few posts of a Twitter page but as soon as you interact with the page or try to navigate elsewhere, you get prompted for a login. So technically they're not preventing access, but they nag you incessantly after you've scrolled past the fold.
So they got on par with pinterest. Strange pattern.
Re: Ask HN: What Has Happened to Twitter?
#10The "uBlock Origin" browser extension blocks Twitter's login prompt and enables you to read posts without logging in.
Upvoted because this answered my confusion about the initial question. I did not see any login prompts pop up where they need not be. :)