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Twitter/X will let people you've blocked see your posts

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Re: Twitter/X will let people you've blocked see your posts

#291
I think it's getting lost that this isn't a one-way street. For trolls, putting additional barriers in their way is a good thing.

But not all blockees are trolls, and not all blockers are using the block to fight trolls. Some may even be using it as a form of trolling themselves.

There isn't an easy way to differentiate an abusive blockee from an abusive blocker. If there were, it would make sense to provide additional incentivize against both anti-social behaviors. But there isn't.

Invisible posts are not a good thing for the health of the platform. It's not just blocker and blockee—everything is connected.

Say you have a very large account that blocks on a whim, accumulating many thousands of blocks, and regularly interacts with posts from other large accounts. That account has hurt the capacity to have meaningful interactions, not with it but with other accounts it interacts with, by eliding chunks of context from conversations for some portion of the community that was blocked on a whim.

Obviously, if that sort of attitude were to spread wide enough, then eventually having posts hidden would make the platform become noticeably worse.

It seems that some of the most vocal opponents of post visibility for blockees are precisely from accounts that block maliciously.

Worth mentioning that having a hair trigger is not necessarily malicious. But if a hair trigger blocker really cares that their posts are hidden, then they are most likely a malicious actor—Why else would they care if their posts are visible to the non-trolls they've blocked?

Re: Twitter/X will let people you've blocked see your posts

#292
post #60

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This whole X debacle has fragmented the microblogging universe which is actually a good thing. TruthSocial and X have become right-wing staples. Threads seems to be full of positivity right now. Mastodon for the techies and niche communities. I've actually started exploring other sane places of community gathering like Reddit and oddly enough YouTube comments. As Karpathy recently commented, the YouTube comments sect…

> I've actually started exploring other sane places of community gathering like Reddit What sane subreddits have you found?

Not OP but I mostly use Reddit for media discussion: /r/movies , /r/books, /r/suggestmeabook, /r/horror, /r/printsf , etc. and they are pretty decent.

I've stayed clear from CS/IT subreddits for a long while now though.

Re: Twitter/X will let people you've blocked see your posts

#293

I do not use The X Formerly Known As Twitter, but if I write a message that is intended to be public (regardless of what service it is on), I would intend that people I had blocked are still able to see the message (and make copies of it) if they wish; I would block them because I don't want to see their messages and I do not want to allow them to send messages to me. I would also not want the number of users who blo…

This. There is no such thing as blocked on a public platform. Everyone has always known viewing the site incognito allows you to see blocked content.

Re: Twitter/X will let people you've blocked see your posts

#294

I think it's getting lost that this isn't a one-way street. For trolls, putting additional barriers in their way is a good thing. But not all blockees are trolls, and not all blockers are using the block to fight trolls. Some may even be using it as a form of trolling themselves. There isn't an easy way to differentiate an abusive blockee from an abusive blocker. If there were, it would make sense to provide addition…

What on earth is “malicious blocking”?

I cannot think of a case where an entity decides they don’t want someone to see their tweets “maliciously”.

The ability to control who does and does not see your content seems like the bare minimum for a social media platform.

Re: Twitter/X will let people you've blocked see your posts

#295
post #197

Earlier quoted context omitted.

you guys are acting like the incognito window doesnt exist? literally one click away

It literally doesn't work. You need to be logged into Twitter to see basically anything. Twitter logged out experience is basically just a login page.

Couldn't you just login with a different account?

Re: Twitter/X will let people you've blocked see your posts

#297
post #244

I haven't seen any official reasoning for this. Does anyone have a link to the explanation for this change occurring to begin with? I would like if there was some technical or biz reasoning behind it, maybe I've just not seen it?

I started blocking advertisers on Twitter whenever I saw an ad since Musk took over. They gradually made the blocking experience related to advertiser accounts harder. First, they started showing “upgrade to ad-free” popups when you blocked an advertiser through an ad’s context menu. Then, they removed block option from the context menu of tweets. (They later put it back under a sub menu). And finally now, they’re getting rid of the feature.

I think they are trying to address the concerns of advertisers about constantly getting blocked causing their reach to diminish. Twitter revenue has gone down 80+% since Musk’s takeover. I don’t know, maybe, not saying “go fuck yourselves” to the advertisers might have helped more, but he do him.

Re: Twitter/X will let people you've blocked see your posts

#298

I think it's getting lost that this isn't a one-way street. For trolls, putting additional barriers in their way is a good thing. But not all blockees are trolls, and not all blockers are using the block to fight trolls. Some may even be using it as a form of trolling themselves. There isn't an easy way to differentiate an abusive blockee from an abusive blocker. If there were, it would make sense to provide addition…

What on earth is “malicious blocking”? I cannot think of a case where an entity decides they don’t want someone to see their tweets “maliciously”. The ability to control who does and does not see your content seems like the bare minimum for a social media platform.

You can precisely control "your content" with subscriptions. Otherwise, "your content" is intermingled with everyone else's. Content is probably the wrong word. Conversation is a better one.

Malicious blocking is blocking a non-troll as an anti-social form of aggression.

It could be:

"I block people who disagree with me because I know it makes them angry."

or

"I block people because I get a lot of interaction, and not being able to see my posts in those interactions so that they are missing context or are forced to log into an alt will worsen people's experience, and knowing that makes me happy."

Imagine how terrible X could become if Musk had the motivation above. He would be able to significantly impact not just your interactions with him, but with a large chunk of the largest and most important accounts—because all roads lead to Musk.

Just blocking with a hair trigger, even blocking non-trolls, is not necessarily malicious. It's malicious if harm is the point of the block and not just a side-effect.

Re: Twitter/X will let people you've blocked see your posts

#299

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You blocked 50k people? Don't you have to block people one by one? How did you even do this?

You could upload blocklists.

Sounds like people weren’t content with how bubble it was and needed extra double bubble.

Re: Twitter/X will let people you've blocked see your posts

#300

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Stop publicizing it to the whole world, yes. The world is chock full of homophobic people and some of them are going to see it if you share it with all of them. What if you're a holocaust denier? What are you going to do? Somehow not share your belief with the world? Yes! Either that or accept the hateful responses you're bound to get if you do share it. Don't forget this is all about public posts. Not anyone's priva…

Holy false equivalency, Batman! Society does not have to just let the worst people in it be as they are. Neither do platforms. Bullying and hateful abuse hurt the platform - users don't want to be subjected to it, advertisers don't want their name next to it. Blocking and other tools to reduce this vile garbage are positive things.

Who are these worst people and who made you the judge? Is it holocaust deniers? Gays? Muslims? Christians? Vegans? Humans are diverse and contradictory in their deeply held beliefs about right and wrong. What about climate change deniers? They get blocked without saying anything vile - just disagreement.
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