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Twitter is using its embedded JavaScript to hide tweets that have been deleted

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Re: Twitter is using its embedded JavaScript to hide tweets that have been deleted

#121

Post by Liquid_Fire »

jazzyjackson wrote: post #102
dheera wrote: post #30

Just screenshot them instead of embedding them. If you cared about JS injection why would you embed anything?!

How are you supposed to prove the tweet actually happened if you just post a screenshot? It's trivial to forge a screenshot of a tweet to say whatever you want.

It's presumably trivial to forge Twitter's "verified" embedding as well, so that doesn't prove anything. (Just have it link to a deleted tweet - plausible deniability!)

If it still exists, just add a link to it underneath the screenshot. If it was deleted, then there's not much you can do, but that's no different than if you had embedded it.

Re: Twitter is using its embedded JavaScript to hide tweets that have been deleted

#122

Post by Santosh83 »

jazzyjackson wrote: post #96

It's a shame there's no better way to preserve a tweet than taking a screenshot -- there's no way to prove that an individual said something, save for perhaps trusting the record on archive.org It doesn't have to be this way. Either the individual or the platform could cryptographically sign content to prove that it really happened. I guess Twitter would prefer a plausible deniability. If anyone screenshots you sayin…

Twitter itself can always prove an individual user said something. I assume they never actually delete any tweet from their system, so a proper law enforcement request can require them to verify that a particular tweet actually did originate from a handle at such and such a time & IP.

Re: Twitter is using its embedded JavaScript to hide tweets that have been deleted

#123

Post by joeraut »

polydevil wrote: post #62
paxys wrote: post #33

Why not just copy paste or screenshot the Tweet? It's bizarre to reference a script from twitter.com directly in your site's source code and then complain that the script is doing exactly what it is supposed to.

- copy paste the content of the tweet - meta data is lost (date and time, author, obv it is possible to copy paste the text and add links to original tweet and link to an author; - screenshot - now you dont have to add custom styles, meta data exists, but it is not usable - you can make is to click on tweet will open a tweet, but click on tweet author will open authors profile. Also screenreaders and bots - they dont…

Great point on accessibility, a guarantee of screen reader support is a benefit that would be lost with screenshots or text without the correct semantics.

Re: Twitter is using its embedded JavaScript to hide tweets that have been deleted

#124

Post by xigoi »

smokey_circles wrote: post #94

> Tampering with the public record Oh come off it already. What a remarkably brain dead opinion. Twitter _is not a public utility_. It owes you _nothing_. Their property, their decision. That simple. I do have an issue with the idea of their JS manipulating your own website but fuck off with this "Twitter is a public service" argument. - They don't have to give you an account - You are not entitled to make demands of…

If Twitter is not a public service, it shouldn't be used for official communication by government representatives.

Re: Twitter is using its embedded JavaScript to hide tweets that have been deleted

#125

Post by 6510 »

ki_ wrote: post #114

hmm. Personally i think when u delete a tweet, you should not be able to embed it. If you changed your mind about a tweet, you should be able to decouple it from your account. If people want to refer to tweets, how about a screenshot? It's safer, faster and cant 404 when twitter is down. And i think the whole "they edited my page" statement is ridiculous. You EMBED a part of twitter into your page. You know it can ch…

True of course, you pretty much hand them the key to your house to do as they please. I remember defunct banner ad services redirecting all pages with banners on them.

The problem is real tho. You casually publish 1-3 things per day. After 20 years you have many thousands of pages that slowly rot away. You could monitor them and delete the articles but that doesn't always work. A tweet and a 5 second video in the middle of a lengthy article don't render the article useless. It becomes something like old paper publications citing lists of unobtainable things.

Re: Twitter is using its embedded JavaScript to hide tweets that have been deleted

#126

Post by bennyp101 »

hda2 wrote: post #45
tofuahdude wrote: post #16

You don't need to use Twitter's JS to show Tweets. If you choose to use their system, you're subject to their rules. If you don't like their rules, don't use their stuff. Calling it "altering the public record" is a little hyperbolic imo. If you want to act as a repository for the public record, you better use your own system. Twitter is under no obligation to retain this kind of stuff on your behalf. I'm not trying…

> Twitter is under no obligation to retain this kind of stuff on your behalf. They declared something worked one way then silently changed how that thing works without properly announcing the change first and giving people enough time to adapt. Would you still be willing to make these excuses if your emails provider decided to do the same thing? Even if it's their system, there's a limit where people would rightfully…

An email provider (which you most likely pay for - and don't publish on a website) is very different to a social media site (that you don't pay for and want it out in the public)

It's a free service that they provide - why can they not change how their system works when they want? People can object whenever they want - but it doesn't change the fact that they don't have any 'rights' to show someone elses content via a 3rd party on their website.

Maybe if you paid to embed tweets? Sure ok, they changed the contract - so deal with that.

Is it a bit annoying if you use it? Probably. Is it bad that the docs are out of date? Ok.

Twitter doesn't have any responsibility to you as someone who wants to quote someone else via their platform.

Re: Twitter is using its embedded JavaScript to hide tweets that have been deleted

#127

Post by nicce »

bennyp101 wrote: post #126
hda2 wrote: post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Twitter is under no obligation to retain this kind of stuff on your behalf. They declared something worked one way then silently changed how that thing works without properly announcing the change first and giving people enough time to adapt. Would you still be willing to make these excuses if your emails provider decided to do the same thing? Even if it's their system, there's a limit where people would rightfully…

An email provider (which you most likely pay for - and don't publish on a website) is very different to a social media site (that you don't pay for and want it out in the public) It's a free service that they provide - why can they not change how their system works when they want? People can object whenever they want - but it doesn't change the fact that they don't have any 'rights' to show someone elses content via…

I would argue that statistically the most people don’t pay for their email provider with money. In that term not a very strong argument.

Re: Twitter is using its embedded JavaScript to hide tweets that have been deleted

#128

Post by ivanche »

victorstanciu wrote: post #55
WatchDog wrote: post #10

Functionality aside embedding random scripts from twitter seems like a big risk for security and privacy. At a minimum, it should probably be embedded in a sandboxed iframe. Just taking a screenshot, and linking to the tweet, seems like a more robust solution, that won't randomly stop working, and doesn't have the same privacy issues.

"Functionality aside embedding random scripts from twitter seems like a big risk for security and privacy." When I started blogging again, I wanted to render my Twitter feed on the homepage, as a sort of bitesize alternative to the regular content, but I too have a deep aversion to allowing external scripts on my websites. So I added some code to my Hugo theme that pulls the tweets from my profile via the Twitter API…

Hey Victor, would you mind sharing that piece of code?

Re: Twitter is using its embedded JavaScript to hide tweets that have been deleted

#129

Post by aembleton »

joeraut wrote: post #123
polydevil wrote: post #62

Earlier quoted context omitted.

- copy paste the content of the tweet - meta data is lost (date and time, author, obv it is possible to copy paste the text and add links to original tweet and link to an author; - screenshot - now you dont have to add custom styles, meta data exists, but it is not usable - you can make is to click on tweet will open a tweet, but click on tweet author will open authors profile. Also screenreaders and bots - they dont…

Great point on accessibility, a guarantee of screen reader support is a benefit that would be lost with screenshots or text without the correct semantics.

I don't think it would be hard to grab the text along with the screenshot and set the alt text.

Re: Twitter is using its embedded JavaScript to hide tweets that have been deleted

#130

Post by theelous3 »

tofuahdude wrote: post #16

You don't need to use Twitter's JS to show Tweets. If you choose to use their system, you're subject to their rules. If you don't like their rules, don't use their stuff. Calling it "altering the public record" is a little hyperbolic imo. If you want to act as a repository for the public record, you better use your own system. Twitter is under no obligation to retain this kind of stuff on your behalf. I'm not trying…

> Twitter is under no obligation to retain this kind of stuff on your behalf.

You have badly missed the most crucial message of the post.

When you copy the embed link, you are copying the string literal of the tweet too.

You put this text on your site. You are the one retaining it.

The twitter module is hiding the text from the rendered page, rather than loading the local copy.

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