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ElonJet Is Now Suspended

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Re: ElonJet Is Now Suspended

#751
post #724

When the Elon/Twitter transaction went through, there were a lot of HN comments stating that they thought that this might actually mean a more open, "freer" Twitter. When I mentioned that Elon had already been using his power unilaterally to re-platform personal allies like Babylon Bee and Ye, I got all sorts of pedantry about the difference between suspension and banning, more pedantry about the Ye reactivation happ…

My hope was for a more transparent Twitter. I guess that's out the window too.

Unfounded hope of course: no one who has, or had, monetary interest in the success of Twitter would or would have gained from transparency.

Twitter is a public company, and may be a digital public square, but it does not have the public good as a rewardable goal.

Re: ElonJet Is Now Suspended

#753

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So we have a company headquartered in SF, and I think something like 98% of twitter's political donations went to democrats, and the employees acted as constant activists whenever the executives didn't take action against high level conservatives (I'll leave aside whether that action was justified or not). Also, if you read the twitter files, the enforcement was fairly lopsided. Look what happened to @libsoftiktok --…

You should look carefully at what Bari Weiss misquotes. Twitter's statement is about Libsoftiktok not doing something suspendable was limited to a short time period, not a blanket statement. But "they got suspended 6 times for legitimate reasons and then the continued to behave badly while staying just inside the written bounds of the rules" isn't really a story.

I've yet to hear a legitimate reason. As far as I can tell, they just angered liberals by reposting their own (ridiculous) content. I'm liberal and even I think that's funny!

Re: ElonJet Is Now Suspended

#754
post #692

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> (I'll leave aside whether that action was justified or not) Seems like an important detail to consider!

The reason it's unimportant is that these same activist employees never bothered to protest other heads of state/terrible people in other countries doing worse things. It was very specifically about US politics and guys they personally disliked, not the application of a fair policy.

Yes shockingly people are more concerned about what's going on in the place they live in than another country on the other side of the world. How many people who work at Twitter could even name the former PM of Malaysia that you mention?

Re: ElonJet Is Now Suspended

#755
post #597

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think a reasonable policy would be you can't post the location of people against their will. Seems like a big security concern. Just because its publicly accessible by some means doesn't mean its okay to blast out. If you agree its fine, would you apply the same reasoning to [favorite politician]? How about a bot that crowdsources the whereabouts of [politician] at any time?

The point is, I think, how you interpret "free speech". In his own tweet [0], he says: "By “free speech”, I simply mean that which matches the law. I am against censorship that goes far beyond the law." The information @ElonJet is publishing is publicly available. One interpretation says: if it's publicly available information, then preventing it being republished is censorship. Therefore Musk is breaking his own rul…

The current interpretation of the 1st Amendment is that anything less than "Fighting Words" (something that will “produce a clear and present danger of a serious intolerable evil that rises above mere inconvenience or annoyance”) the government can't interfere with. The delineated exceptions to free speech are obscenity (which is very poorly defined: the famous Potter Stewart line 'I know it when I see it'), child pornography (reasonably clearly defined), fighting words (defined above) or the related "true and imminent threat to violence or other lawless actions" (emphasis on imminent and lawless). Reposting publicly available data falls into none of those exceptions (after all, the government is the original source of this data!), so the government could not legally take this sort of action, here in the United States.

As an example of what a jury has found to be true and imminent threat, Flip Benham's Save America organization was printed up and distributed "Wanted" posters, with the names and home addresses of doctors who provided abortion services, and put the posters up on the homes and around the neighborhoods of the doctors. Things that don't rise to that level of threat are protected by the 1st Amendment against government retaliation.

Musk is, of course, free to not follow the guidelines that the Government is required to. But by the same token, we have free speech rights and are free to criticize him, make fun of him, and otherwise denigrate him for being a lawless hypocrite who is actively promoting evil in the world.

Re: ElonJet Is Now Suspended

#756

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah I agree that Elon is full of shit, but there's a little lie in here that needs to be addressed: > normal company operation in good faith But it wasn't "normal company operation" because they completely disregarded preexisting company policy for dealing with political figures. Here are political figures that they didn't ban (who were inciting violence) > 20. In June 2018, Iran’s Ayatollah Ali Khamenei tweeted, “#…

Have you considered that many people here actually work in companies and know how they work, meaning they don't need a media source to know that the Twitter files are bogus? In fact, most people here have brains and can think for themselves, and we actually don't rely on a media outlet for all our takes. Have you also considered that there is a huge difference between Khamenei and PMs saber rattling online against ot…

> a president not condemning and (very likely encouraging)

So not condemning something (that is to say, choosing not to speak) and "very likely encouraging" (as opposed to actually encouraging) is somehow worse than calling for outright genocide?

Your comment isn't really clear here. Are denying that the two comments I posted aren't contributing to violence that was actively going on at the time of their posting?

And with regard to this:

> Have you considered that many people here actually work in companies and know how they work, meaning they don't need a media source to know that the Twitter files are bogus? In fact, most people here have brains and can think for themselves, and we actually don't rely on a media outlet for all our takes.

thanks for the copypasta :)

Re: ElonJet Is Now Suspended

#757

I understand this move, but need to point out how hypocritical this is for Mr. Free Speech. Basically, his entire tenure so far has been "free speech for me and the accounts that were rightfully banned for violating the TOS!" in public, and then "we'll deboost anyone who doesn't pay me a subscription" and "let's selectively release internal comms in a misleading way to make normal company operation in good faith seem…

So we have a company headquartered in SF, and I think something like 98% of twitter's political donations went to democrats, and the employees acted as constant activists whenever the executives didn't take action against high level conservatives (I'll leave aside whether that action was justified or not). Also, if you read the twitter files, the enforcement was fairly lopsided. Look what happened to @libsoftiktok --…

> And when that account got doxxed -- which is dangerous and malicious -- the company did nothing.

you know Elon was running the company when this happened, right? which makes it completely orthogonal to your point.

Re: ElonJet Is Now Suspended

#758
post #483

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yup. In Elon's defence (not that he needs or deserves it) -- if I had a bunch of armed and angry folks who wanted to see me dead, I wouldn't want their job made easier thanks to some doofus publicising my location in real-time.

It makes no difference. The location of any civilian aircraft in the air is legally required to be published.

And it still is. It's just not nearly as accessible or overtly obvious as it once was.

I'm not sure if this would have happened if the account wasn't given extra attention in the media in recent weeks. Prior to an article 2 weeks ago, I never even knew that this information was publicly accessible, and now I know if I want to try to figure out where Musk, Gates, Zuckerberg, or other public figures might be, I can check out the author's website.

Now the main site will probably even gain more visibility which will also expose other individuals personal jets. Like I said before, it will be interesting to see what impact this will have elsewhere.

Re: ElonJet Is Now Suspended

#759
Free speech for me but not for thee. Anyone with an ounce of sense saw this coming.

This is public flight data reposted to a public channel. Musk now owns one of the biggest platforms on the internet so I’d argue that not only is the information already public but now in the public interest.

Re: ElonJet Is Now Suspended

#760
post #539

It's amazing to me the mental gymnastics one must have to do to defend the @ElonJet account, simply because you might not like Elon on a personal level. Of course that account should be suspended. Yeah I know, public information/ free speech, blah blah. But it is quite frankly a personal attack on Musk, and I consider it a form of Doxxing. As high profile as Musk is, something like that account is a real threat to hi…

I think it kinda gives food for thought that the only place where ElonJet was banned is his own platform.
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