I resigned from Twitter • Hacker News Board

Re: I resigned from Twitter

#901

Post by wbharding » Tue, Nov 30, 2021, 1:45 AM UTC

I have mixed feelings about the implications for free speech, but in the last 10 years I’ve seen YT comments transition from toxic cesspool to “never was heard a discouraging word.” I started investing in Twitter a few months ago when observing how good they’ve become at selectively hiding tweets that would upset the thread.

Twitter is already taking steps to get less unpleasant. Having a thoughtful tech-oriented CEO work on their issues full time ought to go a long way toward accelerating their progress, if Microsoft is any example.

Re: I resigned from Twitter

#902

Post by herdcall » Tue, Nov 30, 2021, 1:48 AM UTC

StevePerkins wrote: post #820

MaximumYComb wrote: post #813

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I lean moderately left and I really disagree with #3. The explosion of voices is only ones that are "allowed". Twitter is one of the biggest offenders of cancel culture (i.e. silencing people).

Realistically speaking, Twitter has "done more good than harm (unlike Facebook)" because: 1. Younger and left-leaning outrage tends to dominate on Twitter. 2. Older and right-leaning outrage tends to dominate on Facebook. 3. Any conclusions are going to be subjective AF accordingly, and HN is a more young and left-leaning cohort. All social media is a double-edged sword, under the most charitable view.

OK, "Younger and left-leaning outrage tends to dominate on Twitter" ^ "Older and right-leaning outrage tends to dominate on Facebook" => Twitter has "done more good than harm (unlike Facebook)?" That's ageism of first order right there.

Re: I resigned from Twitter

#903

Post by soundnote » Tue, Nov 30, 2021, 1:52 AM UTC

jasonladuke0311 wrote: post #814

63 wrote: post #620

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The difference for me has always beem that Twitter is organized by person rather than by topic. In some ways that's good if I'm following someone because I care about them personally, but usually I follow people because I'm interested in a particular aspect of their work like art or announcements. In those cases, I don't want to hear about their political opinions or what their child did that week. I know you can fol…

Yup. There was this "follow the whole person!" bullshit on infosec Twitter a while back, and it was just such nonsense. I follow them because I'm interested in their thoughts on computer security, no other reason. I couldn't care less about a security nerd's political opinions; it's just as irrelevant to me as a politician's thoughts on computer security.

The politician could be trying to legislate standardizing on Windows XP, banning firewalls and connecting said computers to the Internet.

Re: I resigned from Twitter

#904

Post by boogies » Tue, Nov 30, 2021, 1:52 AM UTC

katbyte wrote: post #891

Goety wrote: post #847

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is one thing that has bothered me with recent twitter.

I just stopped clicking on Twitter links

I just installed https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/privacy-redir... to automatically fix them, and I manually s/twitter.com/nitter.*/ on non-FF browsers.

Re: I resigned from Twitter

#905

Post by astrange » Tue, Nov 30, 2021, 1:59 AM UTC

syshum wrote: post #134

Covzire wrote: post #130

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Highly doubtful as long as they stay in SV. Barring some major backlash I don't think any major company will ever operate there again without making the whole company political.

Well given the ever increasing crime, taxes, costs and lowering of living standards hopefully we will start either seeing companies leave SV, or SV ceasing having any competitive advantage as companies realize their talent pool is not infact limited to SV and there are plenty of high talented people that have no interest in living in SV

If you want to criticize SV you should avoid complaining about "high taxes" since it reveals you don't actually know anything.

The people who live here and complain about that are talking their book, they universally pay like $3000/year property tax on $3 million mansions and don't want Prop13 repealed.

Re: I resigned from Twitter

#906

Post by [deleted] » Tue, Nov 30, 2021, 2:01 AM UTC

mgfist wrote: post #753

mike_d wrote: post #703

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That makes no sense. He is the CEO and on the board, he _is_ the decision maker and could reverse any action he disagreed with. Any disagreement was purely theatre.

A CEO isn't a dictator. They still need board support. If everyone on the board decided that Jack wasn't the guy anymore, Jack can't wave a magic wand and make them disappear. CEOs have been ousted many times.

[deleted]

Re: I resigned from Twitter

#907

Post by [deleted] » Tue, Nov 30, 2021, 2:06 AM UTC

Negitivefrags wrote: post #837

mike_d wrote: post #703

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That makes no sense. He is the CEO and on the board, he _is_ the decision maker and could reverse any action he disagreed with. Any disagreement was purely theatre.

If you think that the CEO of a company can just do whatever they like then you haven't run a company. If you attempt to do things that the employees do not want to do then your company will turn to shit. People will leave, and those that remain will have terrible productivity. Yes, you get some "Just do as I say" points, but you have to choose where to spend them very wisely.

[deleted]

Re: I resigned from Twitter

#908

Post by BbzzbB » Tue, Nov 30, 2021, 2:14 AM UTC

r00fus wrote: post #788

delaaxe wrote: post #762

Earlier quoted context omitted.

From what I hear that's not the case the with Zuckerberg, in that most decisions go through him. I would guess the same with Elon

That's because Zuckerberg stacked the decks that way because he pressed his advantage early. He owns controlling interest of his operation and it can't be wrested from him. I don't think it's the best approach to manage a company but it's sure been lucrative for Mark.

>it's sure been lucrative for Mark

I don't hear many FB shareholders complaining either, I wouldn't claim equal voting rights on my few shares even if I could (please don't crucify me HN, I'm just a tiny fish that dislikes the company but likes the stock). On paper, supershare structures are not a great thing for the common shareholder as it makes their shares basically free of voting rights when the CEO (or united group) holds such a supermajority. In practice, a strong operator like Mark gets more leeway to steer the ship with fewer barriers and inside power struggles. Imagine if the board stopped him from buying IG or WA, these purchases were very controversial at the time and many thought he was a lunatic for paying such a steep price, it only looks genius in hindsight. When/while it works, it is an effective governance structure.

Notable that these types of structures are no longer allowed, companies like Facebook, Google and Berkshire (no super-majority here) got grandfathered in.

Re: I resigned from Twitter

#909

Post by judge2020 » Tue, Nov 30, 2021, 2:16 AM UTC

peoplefromibiza wrote: post #853

madeofpalk wrote: post #838

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Compare to before, where the only voices you heard where ones that were allowed by a hand full of media execs.

I don't see Twitter as an improvement over what we had before. The same people controlling the media once, are on the boards of the companies that allegedly made the change possible. On the other hand, their faces are hidden now, so we can't really say if a certain topic is legitimately important for the general public or the consensus has been fabricated or, even worse, their platform has been abused and we won't kn…

> On the other hand, their faces are hidden now,

Having a name and face didn't exactly help pre-social media, see Rush Limbaugh and the rise of dishonest & polarizing media post-fairness doctrine.

Re: I resigned from Twitter

#910

Post by throw_m239339 » Tue, Nov 30, 2021, 2:16 AM UTC

Ajedi32 wrote: post #604

_whiteCaps_ wrote: post #572

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Visually impaired people using a screenreader won't be able to read it.

Can screen readers still not read text in images? Years ago I could understand that being a problem, but now? If that's still true then it seems to me those screen readers could really use an upgrade. My phone has been able to copy text out of screenshots flawlessly for years . I do agree with the overall point though that images are a suboptimal way of conveying text.

> Can screen readers still not read text in images?

They shouldn't have to do OCR, a description of the image should be provided, there is even an attribute for that on the web, it's called "alt", or use picture/caption. Twitter and its shitty UI has no excuse.