The Twitter Files, Part Six • Hacker News Board

Re: The Twitter Files, Part Six

#441

Post by colordrops » Sat, Dec 17, 2022, 5:41 AM UTC

Apocryphon wrote: post #424

colordrops wrote: post #419

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No government entity should be involved in the slightest in policing media in order to "protect" elections. It's very subjective and extremely ripe for abuse. The only reason election outcomes are so vulnerable to media manipulation is because the US political system is captured by cynical corporate interests that draw an arbitrary line unrelated to idealism across a set of issues to split voters almost perfectly at…

> No government entity should be involved in the slightest in policing media in order to "protect" elections. It's very subjective and extremely ripe for abuse. The FEC can impose all sorts of fines, they arguably have more teeth than this.

Let me clarify: they should not be involved in "policing the particulars of content posted on media".

Re: The Twitter Files, Part Six

#442

Post by woooooo » Sat, Dec 17, 2022, 5:42 AM UTC

cmdli wrote: post #438

scifibestfi wrote: post #433

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why are they contacting Twitter as the FBI in a backchannel to report potentially ToS offending tweets as opposed to the way we all report tweets to Twitter? Or indeed at all when they're not illegal tweets. Imagine Trump is in charge of the FBI.

Because more important users get special treatment? If you are a user that are of special importance to the business (like politicians, news outlets, or major Twitter users), then of course their requests are going to get escalated more quickly. Twitter isn’t a democracy; some users matter a lot more to them than others, and it’s not really based on political lines.

That's the point of the Twitter Files (tm). Shining a light on how that process worked.

It is of course tied up with partisan politics, who won or lost this week from some particular story, but more transparency is good.

Re: The Twitter Files, Part Six

#443

Post by jacquesm » Sat, Dec 17, 2022, 5:42 AM UTC

scifibestfi wrote: post #433

angelbreakfree wrote: post #395

The wildest part of the Twitter files is the unhinged framing that they are presented under. 1. Anyone who has been in a tech company knows that there is internal lingo that refers to features we devs make. But it's presented as being an "Orwellian language" 2. Based on the emails he posts, the agencies give links to review based on tips they receive or their own intel and twitter then decides if it violates ToS or n…

Why are they contacting Twitter as the FBI in a backchannel to report potentially ToS offending tweets as opposed to the way we all report tweets to Twitter? Or indeed at all when they're not illegal tweets. Imagine Trump is in charge of the FBI.

Think of it as a priority queue in terms of software. Does it make more sense now?

If the FBI had to go through the same queue as Joe Average then their requests may well end up at the head of the queue too late for action. The same goes for celebrities, advertisers and so on. All of these have different contact points. And because law enforcement contact is one step away from the company doing something that is potentially illegal their messages are given a higher priority.

Re: The Twitter Files, Part Six

#444

Post by exodust » Sat, Dec 17, 2022, 5:44 AM UTC

jacquesm wrote: post #258

jasonhansel wrote: post #257

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.

The implication of chipping in might mean an unwise alignment with Roth's PhD idea.

His idea wasn't even "Grindr for teens". It was worse because he wasn't proposing a separate service. His idea was to update those sites to accommodate young people. Yoth wrote: "those services should consider offering toned-down content alongside adult fare."

Even if we're charitable, Yoth's use of the word "alongside" was unfortunate. Less charitable, a serious error. It's unrealistic to expect a service with such a concentrated historical purpose for gay adults, could pivot to a harmonized family-friendly vibe for young and old.

I wonder how he landed such a role at Twitter over other applicants, and what criteria he met, that others did not.

Re: The Twitter Files, Part Six

#445

Post by jacquesm » Sat, Dec 17, 2022, 5:44 AM UTC

threeseed wrote: post #434

jacquesm wrote: post #81

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The goal seems to be to distract from Musk selling off Tesla at breakneck speed. Every time there is a big hoopla around Musk the first thing I do is check the stock price and sure enough it seems to be dropping like a stone in tandem with the news releases.

Also I think the idea is to try and attract conservatives from other apps e.g. TruthSocial. Good idea in theory except that many of those users aren't as well-behaved so to speak. And so the overall quality of the discourse has noticeably dropped since Musk took over.

Good point, Musk is now in direct competition with Truth Social, Parler and so on. I had not given that any thought but it explains some of the more bizarre moves of the last weeks.

Re: The Twitter Files, Part Six

#446

Post by djur » Sat, Dec 17, 2022, 5:45 AM UTC

kodyo wrote: post #402

djur wrote: post #308

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Can you cite an example of that? I've read all of the threads so far and none of them demonstrate an account being taken down at the government's request.

The document dump contains evidence of government agents telling Twitter to "look into" things and Twitter responding that they "handled" it. Government thugs don't need to give explicit orders to have their wishes followed, especially if the thugs in question make it sound like they share your ideological goals. Nice little company you got there. Shame if something were to happen to it.

This is incorrect. The "handled" response you're referring to was regarding a list of links to leaked nudes of Hunter Biden reported by the Biden campaign:

https://i0.wp.com/www.techdirt.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/1...

As I've said, Taibbi has been very clear that he has no evidence of government involvement in any response to the Hunter Biden story.

Re: The Twitter Files, Part Six

#447

Post by jacquesm » Sat, Dec 17, 2022, 5:45 AM UTC

scifibestfi wrote: post #431

amluto wrote: post #253

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> 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?

Is fascism closer to free speech or is it closer to censorship?

No post body was provided.

Re: The Twitter Files, Part Six

#448

Post by Apocryphon » Sat, Dec 17, 2022, 5:45 AM UTC

colordrops wrote: post #441

Apocryphon wrote: post #424

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> No government entity should be involved in the slightest in policing media in order to "protect" elections. It's very subjective and extremely ripe for abuse. The FEC can impose all sorts of fines, they arguably have more teeth than this.

Let me clarify: they should not be involved in "policing the particulars of content posted on media".

https://twitter.com/CNNPolitics/status/1400166091586932736

Re: The Twitter Files, Part Six

#449

Post by jacquesm » Sat, Dec 17, 2022, 5:47 AM UTC

protastus wrote: post #319

NelsonMinar wrote: post #236

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…

Corporate records and correspondence can be made public due to a lawsuit. So the risk of disclosure isn't new, and anyone should consider it whether they work at a startup or at a large company. Just another incentive to act with integrity and keep personal correspondence out of corporate systems.

Excellent advice.

Re: The Twitter Files, Part Six

#450

Post by djur » Sat, Dec 17, 2022, 5:47 AM UTC

cassac wrote: post #378

djur wrote: post #262

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The FBI cannot censor people, period. That’s fascism and illegal in the US The FBI emailing Twitter to report possible violations of Twitter's terms of service is not censorship and it is not illegal. > This effectively gives trump, et al a direct path to a lawsuit against the federal government The FBI reported to Trump during the 2020 election cycle. It was headed by his own handpicked director, under the supervi…

I think what people are concerned about is the selectiveness of the reports. What if the FBI only happened to report violations by Asians. Or only violations by women? I guess it would not be censorship, and I guess it would not be not illegal either, but it would make people wonder if there is an agenda. It’s as much about the violations reported as the violations left unreported.

The FBI reported tweets from Democrats as well as Republicans, and also apparently a parody of the pro wrestler The Undertaker where the joke is that he craps his pants regularly. Not seeing any evidence that there's any political bias to the reports, and if there was I certainly wouldn't expect the FBI of all organizations to be biased against conservatives.