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On Using Twitter
121–130 of 150 posts
Re: On Using Twitter
#122I have an honest question for Twitter users of HN: what's the net positive value of Twitter to your life? It feels like using Twitter or not has been an uninterrupted argument for years, even on HN, as if on one end your rational brain knows Twitter is detrimental to your mental health, but on the other end: it's a great dopamine, and outrage dispenser.
It's the best way to find current information for emerging news when you need it ASAP. EX. lineup/injury news for daily fantasy sports prior to lock.
Can also be pretty handy when you're at a convention/event.
Re: On Using Twitter
#123I have a Twitter account. I think I've logged into it on average about once every year for all of 5 minutes. It's actually surprising to me how much engagement I have on Twitter, I guess people find me organically because I gave a talk at a conference or something. I usually have quite a few mentions from months before when I check it.
Nonetheless, I thought Twitter was doomed to create terrible outcomes from the moment it was born. You cannot share any new, meaningful, and serious thought in 140 characters. Every single one of my experiences and attempts to use it afterwards just confirmed my initial belief. I would much rather interact with people on IRC, via mailing lists, or on HN than do so via Twitter. Twitter is a cesspool.
Re: On Using Twitter
#124Earlier I used to follow all sorts of famous twitter accounts and had joined all sorts of (ugly debate). I really liked Twitter in comparison to FB in the sense that it introduced me people of millions types from all over the world. On FB, everyone was already known to me so there was no novelty in what I was browsing. However, later on I realized that Twitter is actually a "outrage generating machine". Everyone is o…
> strictly tweets only about programming, math, history and other such stuffs in robotic manner (I.e. without any hidden agenda or connotations)
If you are tweeting about programming in a robotic manner while black people are being murdered by police, or while we rush towards a blue ocean event, you do have a hidden agenda.
Pretending that you can talk about the programming in a 'neutral' way is a radically political opinion. I get it, you actively and loudly don't want to discuss anything that isn't immediately interesting to you without making you have to question anything. But at the very least you have to concede that that itself is a strongly political statement.
Re: On Using Twitter
#125Earlier quoted context omitted.
I learned this in the early 90s on BBSes, MUDs, Usenet, and forums, before I even discovered the Web. Everything old is new again. Twitter is fine. It’s people who suck. Exercise your own restraint and freedom to associate. Externalizing blame is to throw up your hands and to join all the other naysayers in yelling at clouds.
Twitter has a machine learning algorithm that actively steers people towards political/controversial content. If you choose to see tweets "recent first" to avoid this, Twitter will accidentally-on-purpose 'forget' this every few days, and return you to the AI-generated anger maximization feed. That's blatantly user-hostile behavior that wasn't present on Usenet or IRC.
You can bypass all of this and turn Twitter into a useful newsfeed:
Re: On Using Twitter
#126I have an honest question for Twitter users of HN: what's the net positive value of Twitter to your life? It feels like using Twitter or not has been an uninterrupted argument for years, even on HN, as if on one end your rational brain knows Twitter is detrimental to your mental health, but on the other end: it's a great dopamine, and outrage dispenser.
It used to be fun, and in smaller communities still is. Even the politics used to be better. Now social media has destroyed the possibility of rational politics.
Socrates, a world-renown authority on rationality, wasn't that bullish on rational politics -- long before social media.
Re: On Using Twitter
#127Earlier quoted context omitted.
> and most of them were spending their time talking about completely unrelated US political matters and petty drama 99% of the time and very little actual programming stuff. And that was one of the brilliant things about Google+: You could post under different topics so people could read my programming or local posts without having to cope with my religious or political posts (just examples, I never got around to the…
>You could post under different topics so people could read my programming or local posts without having to cope with my religious or political posts (just examples, I never got around to the two last ones I think). I don't think that would work thesedays. If you had a political post, I'd say you'd correctly keep it in its correct circle (based on you highlighting the feature here), but since Google+ was a thing, a n…
Then you unfollow them.
Re: On Using Twitter
#128Earlier quoted context omitted.
Because the author is immediately pandering to the potential twitterati reaction to his article?
Her article. As they told you in that sentence. And their byline. (I know there's some weird campaign against pronouns but that doesn't mean that all people writing on the internet are now "him")
oops, my mistake
Re: On Using Twitter
#129Earlier I used to follow all sorts of famous twitter accounts and had joined all sorts of (ugly debate). I really liked Twitter in comparison to FB in the sense that it introduced me people of millions types from all over the world. On FB, everyone was already known to me so there was no novelty in what I was browsing. However, later on I realized that Twitter is actually a "outrage generating machine". Everyone is o…
> Later on I unfollowed 90% accounts and stuck to those accounts which strictly tweets only about programming, math, history and other such stuffs in robotic manner (I.e. without any hidden agenda or connotations). I unfollowed everyone who have even a slightest chance of tweeting about politics. Also I stopped tweeting and replying to anybody.
This is the best way to use Twitter, especially your decision to not post or reply to anyone.
We're all prone to say something stupid on online, and if we attach our real identities to those statements, like many people on Twitter, someone somewhere will weaponize it. And, if you have enough "clout" on Twitter, something you tweeted yesterday, or a decade ago, can end your career. This is the world we live in.
Re: On Using Twitter
#130>Cultivate a good set of accounts to follow Man I'm so done with that. Even cultivating a group of accounts on say a topic ... they're still people so I get their angry rants about whatever issue. And I respect their right to be a person and tweet about what they want, but that's a double edged sword as far as my interest goes. I really don't want to see a twitter spat, ever. Even if I AGREE with someone I'm followin…
> they're still people so I get their angry rants about whatever issue.
"Why X happened to me and why YOU should be enraged, a thread"
"I'm mad, so I'm going to make a thread, in hopes of it going viral and, later, can be used for my own financial gain: a thread"