X's new country-of-origin feature reveals many 'US' accounts to be foreign-run

Post by mlrtime » Mon, Nov 24, 2025, 11:56 AM UTC

ninkendo wrote: post #63

andybak wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I might have a very different reading of the parable of the cave to you? Can you elaborate? (At the risk of spoiling the joke)

I’ll take a stab: because twitter isn’t reality, it’s a microcosm. A tempest in a teapot. It’s something that if you step outside of, you realize it’s not the real world. Leaving social media can be thought of as emerging from the cave: you interact with people near you who actually have a shared experience to yours (if only geographically) and you get a feel for what real world conversation is like: full of nuance a…

Post by mlrtime » Mon, Nov 24, 2025, 12:00 PM UTC

brookst wrote: post #202

throwaway48476 wrote: post #58

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Country of origin is based on IP. Many British accounts are using VPNs due to the online safety act and this is noted by X. X also shows the country of the app store the app was downloaded from which is more accurate. Ironically many of the people in favor of banning VPNs are themselves using a VPN.

> Ironically many of the people in favor of banning VPNs are themselves using a VPN. It’s ironic but also completely typical. Same way so many people publicly freaking out about homosexuality turn out to be gay. There’s something in human nature that makes people shout about the dangers of the things they themselves do, some kind of camouflage instinct I guess.

Post by mlrtime » Mon, Nov 24, 2025, 12:03 PM UTC

ebbi wrote: post #36

lateforwork wrote: post #24

I assume the country of origin is detected based on IP address. These fakers will now create Azure VMs hosted in the US, then login to those VMs and use X from the VM. A lot of scammers disguise their location using this method.

Are Azure VMs different to a VPN? Sorry I'm not the most technical. Reason I ask is because there are few people I follow that use VPNs but their location is accurate on X. Also, X also shows where you downloaded the app from, e.g. [Country] App Store, so that one might be a bit more difficult to get around.

Post by davkan » Mon, Nov 24, 2025, 12:05 PM UTC

pfannkuchen wrote: post #240

ragazzina wrote: post #236

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What did you learn in school that was actually fake?

I didn’t say it was fake, per se. What happens is undersampling that conveniently aliases with a supporting story for the present moral zeitgeist. It’s not hard to find samples that contradict the story. This happens primarily in history, but also in auxiliary classes that touch on history or morality such as various humanities courses and what little is covered of economics.

Post by mlrtime » Mon, Nov 24, 2025, 12:10 PM UTC

awesome_dude wrote: post #160

macintux wrote: post #104

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yep, I effectively landed my favorite job by engaging with the Erlang community on Twitter. I miss it, but it just got to be too toxic during the 2016 election cycle (in fairness, everything was too toxic then, and it hasn’t gotten better since).

I think that ALL communities become toxic as they grow I often hear that one community, or another, is "really good, not toxic at all, which is true when it starts (for tech, whilst it's "new" and everyone is still interested in figuring out how it works, sharing their learnings, and actively working to encourage people to also take interest) Then idealism works it way in - this community is the greatest that every e…