Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

XCancel service is suspended until further notice

xcancel.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

541–550 of 750 posts

Re: XCancel service is suspended until further notice

#541

Post by ruszki »

asdff wrote: post #447
phforms wrote: post #434

I know it’s hard for some people (for understandable reasons), but at some point we have to ignore the X site completely and make politicians and public services/institutions aware that some people do not have or want access to the site. That is the only way anything might change someday. Maybe I’m just being naive here, but what else can you do? xcancel was amazing and I hope they can continue in some way. But since…

I don't understand who all these people are who keep saying 'but I need twitter for my local politicians.' Like really? I have not followed any local politicians or authorities twitter and I still get relevant information. Believe it or not, which you might not if all you do is parrot these comments and I have seen this very comment line of thinking parroted for YEARS about twitter, most people do not follow the city…

Where I live currently in Europe utility companies need to inform me even in an offline way. There is no need for internet for this.

I'm reading the news with a two week delay for almost a decade, and I haven't missed anything worthwhile. There are exactly zero reasons to read Facebook/Twitter for it. For example, the value of the current US administration's word is zero. When they say something, there is no change in probability distributions in anything anymore. This two week delay makes this very obvious on the occasions when I checked the latest state of some issues. But others are the same, just for different reasons: in reality you have a very small effect on any highly politicized topics. When parents trust their kids less than politicians, then there is not much to do with everyday tools, like arguing (there are some places where there is a value, but those won't ever move the needle).

Re: XCancel service is suspended until further notice

#542

Post by pessimizer »

xyst wrote: post #431
rob74 wrote: post #99

Maybe instead of trying to get rid of services that provide a more convenient access to X to non-logged-in users, they should realize that there is a real market behind these services - users that will likely never sign up to X, but who want to read/watch some content without the incessant nagging and limitations that X subjects non-logged-in users to?

As if the new owners of twitter give a shit about its sustainability. It is all about capturing the platform to change the conversation around 2024 US presidential election cycle and US politics. It’s effectively become a political propaganda machine owned by billionaires

He was forced to buy it after desperately trying to pull out, and shitlibs cheered.

Re: XCancel service is suspended until further notice

#543

Post by mahboi »

immibis2 wrote: post #515
asdff wrote: post #447

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't understand who all these people are who keep saying 'but I need twitter for my local politicians.' Like really? I have not followed any local politicians or authorities twitter and I still get relevant information. Believe it or not, which you might not if all you do is parrot these comments and I have seen this very comment line of thinking parroted for YEARS about twitter, most people do not follow the city…

The current American government is basically entirely comprised of people who were terminally online on Twitter and communicating with the right politicians - those people got everything they wanted. This seems like evidence that it actually does matter.

I've always had this thought that the Trump administration's views of other countries comes disproportionately from insanely online users on Twitter and Reddit, who might actually be bots too. Like the thing about not working with European countries "that hate us."

Re: XCancel service is suspended until further notice

#544

Post by fuzzfactor »

whalesalad wrote: post #482
phforms wrote: post #434

I know it’s hard for some people (for understandable reasons), but at some point we have to ignore the X site completely and make politicians and public services/institutions aware that some people do not have or want access to the site. That is the only way anything might change someday. Maybe I’m just being naive here, but what else can you do? xcancel was amazing and I hope they can continue in some way. But since…

> at some point we have to ignore the X site completely I've been doing that for years. Since just prior to Elon's purchase of it. Nothing of value in my life has been lost.

Things like twitter aren't supposed to be worth money anyway :)

In an ideal world nothing would be able to change that.

Edit: not my downvote btw, where did that come from? - - corrective upvote instead contrary to bot action

Re: XCancel service is suspended until further notice

#545

Post by mahboi »

multjoy wrote: post #533
aperrien wrote: post #489

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is it possible to help or encourage our local municipal services to have either an RSS or BlueSky feed? At this point, it's becoming apparent that putting all the information eggs in the twitter basket is/was a bad idea. This is a place where open source standards should shine.

This is an area where Mastodon ought to shine. Departments/organisations can create their own instances, with named users. Interested constituents follow those users with their client of choice. Direct following means you avoid the federation dramas. No algorithim means that people get the updates they want when they're posted. Users get a familiar-looking client to bang out the quick updates. Obviously the issue is…

On the last point, it's a lot harder to manage than you're making it sound. A public org isn't going to gate signups.

Re: XCancel service is suspended until further notice

#546

Post by dburkland »

arppacket wrote: post #540
phforms wrote: post #434

I know it’s hard for some people (for understandable reasons), but at some point we have to ignore the X site completely and make politicians and public services/institutions aware that some people do not have or want access to the site. That is the only way anything might change someday. Maybe I’m just being naive here, but what else can you do? xcancel was amazing and I hope they can continue in some way. But since…

This is what we should have done the moment a Nazi bought Twitter in order to create a "vibe shift".

Thanks for the laugh

Re: XCancel service is suspended until further notice

#547

Post by WarmWash »

swed420 wrote: post #535
WarmWash wrote: post #371

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Funny that your critique is still capitalist...

It's not though. That's literally the point of the article.

The article that I need to hand over my monetizable information over to read? The article written by a journalist getting paid to produce content so it can be pushed to the market of articles to retrieve more than it's cost to procure?

If they are going to claim to ride a high horse, I'm not paying them any credence when they show up on the same dinkey donkey as everyone else they loudly spite.

Re: XCancel service is suspended until further notice

#548

Post by burnt-resistor »

phforms wrote: post #434

I know it’s hard for some people (for understandable reasons), but at some point we have to ignore the X site completely and make politicians and public services/institutions aware that some people do not have or want access to the site. That is the only way anything might change someday. Maybe I’m just being naive here, but what else can you do? xcancel was amazing and I hope they can continue in some way. But since…

Support and platforming of neo-Nazis and nation state sockpuppets are big reasons to avoid X. Boycott, divest, sanction, and shun those who intend to harm society.

Re: XCancel service is suspended until further notice

#549

Post by GolfPopper »

WarmWash wrote: post #321
swed420 wrote: post #300

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The problem companies have is that "doesn't suck" generally means "it's free with no ads". There's no reason you can't abolish login walls while still serving ads. > The internet has this innate expectation that everything digital be totally free Capital interests have this innate expectation that everything must be profitable. This vision is ripe for the picking: https://www.noemamag.com/the-last-days-of-social-me…

>Capital interests have this innate expectation that everything must be profitable. What rubs me the wrong way about statements like this, is that it is almost always said by people who totally miss that they are advocating for things that are personally profitable for them. A website that allows you to skirt paywalls, is immensely profitable to the end user. That same end user, who detests the idea of having to spen…

>The actual break from "corporate profits" is to not engage with the corporations products at all.

This is difficult to do when corporations control elements of the public sphere and the proceed to run them in such a way as to maximize profits but to the disadvantage of the public.

In its infancy, I recall frequent descriptions of Twitter as the "new public square". A company doesn't get to have its cake and eat it, too. If something that is a public good is operated to maximize private profits instead of the public good, there's going to be conflict with the public.

Perhaps what we need is a broader classification of utilities, and then run them for public benefit rather than private profit, so the citizenry truly can choose to live their lives as something other than rural hermits without engaging with for-profit corporations.

Re: XCancel service is suspended until further notice

#550

Post by samizdis »

aperrien wrote: post #489
bpt3 wrote: post #472

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Your utility will post a highly localized service outage that might only affect 1 block of a city or less to their world facing twitter feed? And not simply alert customers via their phone on file as they've done for me forever? It doesn't match your very contrived example specifically, but yes essential services in my major metropolitan area provide more useful and timely information via twitter/X than other sourc…

Is it possible to help or encourage our local municipal services to have either an RSS or BlueSky feed? At this point, it's becoming apparent that putting all the information eggs in the twitter basket is/was a bad idea. This is a place where open source standards should shine.

How about municipal councils looking around at any remaining "mainstream media" local outlets and committing to post relevant notices/updates on their websites?

This is something I wanted to push while working on newsroom CMS projects: giving direct input access to the CMS from external bodies - police, fire, ambulance etc. Posts could be vetted/edited by newsrooms, as with any externally filed copy, but turnaround would be a matter of half-a-minute or so. Either that or enable direct publishing permissions to said authorities.

Post reply on HN