Twitter to ban political advertising • Hacker News Board

Re: Twitter to ban political advertising

#11

Post by scarejunba » Wed, Oct 30, 2019, 8:15 PM UTC

acollins1331 wrote: post #2

We don't let blatantly false ads run on TV. Why is it so hard for Facebook or Twitter to do the same thing?

False premise: https://www.politifact.com/truth-o-meter/statements/2019/oct...

Re: Twitter to ban political advertising

#12

Post by psychometry » Wed, Oct 30, 2019, 8:15 PM UTC

jdkee wrote: post #5

Here is Jack Dorsey's commentary thread: https://twitter.com/jack/status/1189634360472829952

If only there was a way to communicate more than a couple sentences at the time over the internet. Someone should make that!

Re: Twitter to ban political advertising

#13

Post by freebasenic » Wed, Oct 30, 2019, 8:15 PM UTC

jdkee wrote: post #5

Here is Jack Dorsey's commentary thread: https://twitter.com/jack/status/1189634360472829952

https://threadreaderapp.com/thread/1189634360472829952.html

Re: Twitter to ban political advertising

#14

Post by wnevets » Wed, Oct 30, 2019, 8:15 PM UTC

Is #FreeHongKong considered a political ad?

Re: Twitter to ban political advertising

#15

Post by minimaxir » Wed, Oct 30, 2019, 8:15 PM UTC

The real question is how long it will take for Facebook to follow suit.

Re: Twitter to ban political advertising

#16

Post by eqmvii » Wed, Oct 30, 2019, 8:15 PM UTC

jdkee wrote: post #5

Here is Jack Dorsey's commentary thread: https://twitter.com/jack/status/1189634360472829952

This is a great decision, and that's a well reasoned thread. Hopefully this puts pressure on other big players like Facebook.

Re: Twitter to ban political advertising

#17

Post by Barrin92 » Wed, Oct 30, 2019, 8:15 PM UTC

jayess wrote: post #6

Now the fun part -- defining political ads.

in 95% of cases it's a trivial decision, in particular if you want to stop the most egregious offenders. It's like the infamous line about porn, you know it when you see it.

On edge cases time will work out standards, that's what these companies ought to employ humans for.

Re: Twitter to ban political advertising

#18

Post by [deleted] » Wed, Oct 30, 2019, 8:16 PM UTC

[deleted]

Re: Twitter to ban political advertising

#19

Post by apendleton » Wed, Oct 30, 2019, 8:16 PM UTC

jayess wrote: post #6

Now the fun part -- defining political ads.

I would say start here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eight_Magic_Words and amend as necessary.

Re: Twitter to ban political advertising

#20

Post by busterarm » Wed, Oct 30, 2019, 8:16 PM UTC

throwaway5752 wrote: post #9

acollins1331 wrote: post #2

We don't let blatantly false ads run on TV. Why is it so hard for Facebook or Twitter to do the same thing?

Because Facebook wants those ads. They productize the ability to run them, and it's revenue they want. They lie about or disguise their participation in the market and their policies policing that content. Facebook continues to take steps to get more of that revenue. It's not "hard", it's just just they don't want to do it.

I'm not sure that's it. Twitter was going to be sued if they allowed one party to advertise but not the other. This decision allows them to still behave with some partisanship via their moderation policy.

Facebook is taking the safer position in this case, IMO, from a legal/regulatory perspective. It'll be interesting to see what shakes out.