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Poll: Are you going to leave Twitter after Musk's acquisition?

news.ycombinator.com

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Re: Poll: Are you going to leave Twitter after Musk's acquisition?

#91

Post by amalcon »

rglullis wrote: post #55
amalcon wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They've pretty much all tried having comment sections, and removed them. Turns out, it's kind of hard and the incentives discourage it.

This is not what I mean. What I mean is that they (CNN, FOX, MSNBC, NYT, WSJ et caterva) could, e.g, set up a Mastodon server and give accounts to their staff and at least encourage cross-posting. They could give free accounts to their subscribers. There is so much that they could to send a strong signal that they are against Twitter/Facebook as the single place of public discourse. But of course they don't do any of…

I don't think this is the best way to send that message. The best way to send that message would be to stop breathlessly covering the various goings-on on Twitter. If done well, that sends the message that there are plenty of other ways to have public discourse than on two specific websites. Edit: Trying to compete with Twitter specifically will just reenforce the impression that what's happening there is uniquely valuable.

Attempting to clone Twitter, even if only for their staff and subscribers and/or in a federated form, opens them up to the exact same issues that motivated them to get rid of the comment sections. There would even be the additional problem that they'd need to advertise the thing. The software being available off the shelf doesn't matter, because the software is not the only hard part.

Of course NYT are more interested in buying Wordle than in trying to "combat" the big tech oligopoly. They also didn't try to compete with, say, Ma Bell or Clear Channel, but they have been a big player in the word game space for longer than the personal computer has existed.

Re: Poll: Are you going to leave Twitter after Musk's acquisition?

#92

Post by SecurityMinded »

I only have a twitter account, just because.. I never post anything but planning to do so to piss off some people with "holier than thou" attitudes, especially ones who are screaming they are going to leave twitter if Musk acquires twitter. It is gonna be fun. For those snowflakes who are going to leave, don't let the door hit your tushies.

Re: Poll: Are you going to leave Twitter after Musk's acquisition?

#93

Post by calciphus »

irvingprime wrote: post #89
somesortofthing wrote: post #28

I honestly don't think it'll change that much. Musk's statements thus far suggest that he lacks a basic understanding of the problems inherent to running a platform like Twitter, so he'll probably just get frustrated and lose interest once he starts running into them. I suspect that the company will end up in the hands of a group indistinguishable from the current board, except they'll be Musk's friends.

Actually, he sounds to me like he has an entirely reasonable understanding of twitter. Can you provide specific areas where you think his understanding is deficient?

https://www.techdirt.com/2022/04/15/elon-musk-demonstrates-h...

Namely I think he vastly underestimates how complex content moderation at scale is.

Re: Poll: Are you going to leave Twitter after Musk's acquisition?

#94

Post by rglullis »

amalcon wrote: post #91
rglullis wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is not what I mean. What I mean is that they (CNN, FOX, MSNBC, NYT, WSJ et caterva) could, e.g, set up a Mastodon server and give accounts to their staff and at least encourage cross-posting. They could give free accounts to their subscribers. There is so much that they could to send a strong signal that they are against Twitter/Facebook as the single place of public discourse. But of course they don't do any of…

I don't think this is the best way to send that message. The best way to send that message would be to stop breathlessly covering the various goings-on on Twitter. If done well, that sends the message that there are plenty of other ways to have public discourse than on two specific websites. Edit: Trying to compete with Twitter specifically will just reenforce the impression that what's happening there is uniquely va…

> The best way to send that message would be to stop breathlessly covering the various goings-on on Twitter.

Reporters are going to report on what brings readers, and one of the most upsetting things about the press nowadays is this idea that they should help "shape the narrative". If the press is truly independent, they could and should report on what happens at Twitter.

In any case, your idea and mine are orthogonal.

> Attempting to clone Twitter

I used Mastodon in the example, but it wouldn't be a twitter clone. This is not what ActivityPub is.

The point of adopting ActivityPub for them would be simply to be able to claim that they can be in control of their own discourse and that they do not depend on Big Tech and their social networks.

> They also didn't try to compete with, say, Ma Bell or Clear Channel,

Is not that they would do it to "compete", they could do it simply to stop contributing to the problem that they are so frequently writing about. And it certainly requires infinitely less resources to run an AP server than to create a phone network. I can profitably run a Mastodon server for the NYT for less than $500/month.

Re: Poll: Are you going to leave Twitter after Musk's acquisition?

#95

Post by rglullis »

riffic wrote: post #90
rglullis wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is not what I mean. What I mean is that they (CNN, FOX, MSNBC, NYT, WSJ et caterva) could, e.g, set up a Mastodon server and give accounts to their staff and at least encourage cross-posting. They could give free accounts to their subscribers. There is so much that they could to send a strong signal that they are against Twitter/Facebook as the single place of public discourse. But of course they don't do any of…

They don't even need to use Mastodon itself. CNN, Fox, MSNBC, NYT etc could put ActivityPub in their content management systems and be direct participants to this wider standards-based ecosystem. btw it'd be nice to see the fedi grow beyond being the "mastoverse", other implementations of AP exist

Definitely, I used Mastodon as an example because it is what has become associated as the alternative for Twitter. But the important thing would be for them to adopt ActivityPub and get the "public square" out of the control from any single entity.

Re: Poll: Are you going to leave Twitter after Musk's acquisition?

#97

Post by matt321 »

d4mi3n wrote: post #10

I'd like to call out that individual responses to this don't matter. What matters is if Twitter remains a place for public discourse. So long as we allow public discourse to happen on private platforms that aren't held responsible for maintaining the availability, accountability, and freedom (as in speech) of these public forums, Twitter will continue to be problematic. Whether it's Musk or a private group of shareho…

freedom of peach is only a thing in the USA. Your forget that most of the humans on this planet aren't in the USA an don't expect freedom of peach.
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