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The Twitter Files, Part Six

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Re: The Twitter Files, Part Six

#251

There's an odd new risk for startups: someone buys your company and then releases all the internal documents with hostile intent. The Twitter stuff that's come out now has been pretty uninteresting, surprising and often basically telling a story of people doing the best job they could in difficult circumstances. But if you are at a small company consider what all could be acquired and used to defame your employees an…

The thing to really worry about is that someone like Musk has direct access to all of your DMs, including those of politicians the world over.

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Re: The Twitter Files, Part Six

#252

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The Babylon Bee was not banned, the same way someone who tries to go into a store without shoes on isn't "banned." They just need to put on some shoes, then you're allowed in. The Babylon Bee was told that 1 Tweet violated Twitter's policy, and that they needed to delete it to unlock their account. They chose not to.

"All you need to do is renounce your values and violate your principles. What's the big deal?"

What values and principles did the Babylon Bee renounce and violate, exactly

Re: The Twitter Files, Part Six

#253

3. Twitter’s contact with the FBI was constant and pervasive, as if it were a subsidiary. 4. Between January 2020 and November 2022, there were over 150 emails between the FBI and former Twitter Trust and Safety chief Yoel Roth. How is this constant? This is just 1 request every 7 days . I figured it would be more. Also, it's called the FBI. Their job is to investigate federal matters, which includes content on socia…

In an earlier release they also mention regular meetings (weekly?). That was not the only guy being contacted by the FBI either. Regardless, while you may call this “underwhelming” it’s actually hard proof of illegal activity. The FBI cannot censor people, period. That’s fascism and illegal in the US, per multiple Supreme Court rulings. This effectively gives trump, et al a direct path to a lawsuit against the federa…

> Regardless, while you may call this “underwhelming” it’s actually hard proof of illegal activity. The FBI cannot censor people, period.

That’s not even remotely true.

> That’s fascism

May I suggest looking up fascism?

Re: The Twitter Files, Part Six

#254
post #247

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A typical homepage link can cause between 40 and 50K visitors to your website. And that's a small fraction of the total number of users. Millions of pageviews per day, 250K+ registered users and a multiple of that in lurkers. Does that help?

> 250K+ registered users That's the relevant number. So Twitter is about 1000x larger than HN. From a surveillance standpoint, we're really only talking about commenters, on both sites.

True, but Twitter is mostly cat pictures, I think the average HN users could do a lot more damage to society than the average Twitter user.

Re: The Twitter Files, Part Six

#255
post #53

Learned basically nothing here. So the FBI helped Twitter with content moderation? Who gives a crap.

Quoted post unavailable.

Twitter isn't a media outlet; content moderation isn't censorship; routine communications over email aren't "behind closed doors"; suggestions that Twitter investigate certain accounts carry no legal weight.

Re: The Twitter Files, Part Six

#256

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If - for instance - Mike Pence had been murdered (and I believe there was a real possibility that that could have happened) I'm pretty sure that you'd be playing an entirely different tune. The FBI is free to interpret the law and you are free to take them to court if you don't agree with their interpretation. This does not normally need to be spelled out. Next time you receive a request from the police that you thin…

I have no idea how to respond to your comment. You seem to be coming from a world view that has no overlap with mine. I have zero understanding why you'd so condescendingly argue that we should just accept shady behavior by the FBI.

I don't see anything shady. And being pretty anti-authoritarian and having been in contact with LE many, many times over the years including the FBI what struck me first and foremost in all of that is that they did their utmost best to keep it clean.

Re: The Twitter Files, Part Six

#258

Yet another set of overhyped allegations against Yoel Roth, who Elon is currently targeting with a homophobic smear campaign: https://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/2022/12/12/musk-ch...

Roth may well have an excellent case against Musk. I'd definitely chip in.

Re: The Twitter Files, Part Six

#259

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Quoted post unavailable.

In this case reporting two dozen small fry accounts to moderator teams is very weak as far as censorship goes. They’re doing the same thing as everyone else who hits report on Twitter does, except cutting in line. But you can bet there are tens of thousands of businesses, especially Twitter’s advertisers, who have the same if not closer relations with Twitter and, if made displeased, could cause Twitter to censor you…

I don't see anything about being a "small fry" mattering when it comes to the law. It's pretty cut and dried. What the FBI is doing is unconstitutional and illegal. Why are you minimizing it? That they are doing it all is extremely alarming. It's like saying "the concentration camp only has 5 people, what's the big deal?"

And why are you comparing them to private companies? Private companies are not covered by the same laws when it comes to the first amendment.

Re: The Twitter Files, Part Six

#260

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's literally none of those things. The FBI contacted trust and safety and said 'Hey we have concerns about these tweets'. Twitter decided to take them down in some cases. Who is corrupted here? Twitter for taking reports and then deciding how to react to them? The FBI for finding misinformation that might lead to crazies creating mass casualty events? The FBI at no time FORCED twitter to do anything. So it's not vi…

Any time the FBI “asks” a company to do something it’s immediately a form of coercion. Government law enforcement agencies shouldn’t be “asking” for anything unless it’s done under due process of law. Sorry but I 100% disagree.

> Any time the FBI “asks” a company to do something it’s immediately a form of coercion.

That's just obviously false. It was pretty clearly just a suggestion that Twitter investigate violations of its rules, not a demand.

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