This x100. If you have no followers and no one is re-tweeting your vitriolic slime, why should twitter care, they simply want you to stay on the platform. Now if your circle has reach and you are a known public name, they must act as if they care. They play politics to please the masses, without subjecting the masses to the same politicking.
I'm not sure that a plug/PSA about a government program really counts as "shilling your product", we're talking about a program that was enacted by the congress and signed into law by the president, at a minimum it's totally distinct from plugging a product that you own or profit from.
"Echo chamber" is a deliberately pejorative term, which I think is unfair here. If you use Twitter to discuss your beliefs, then, yes, it functions like an echo chamber, and that can be a bad thing because when your beliefs are wrong, they won't be constructively challenged.
But I generally use Twitter to discuss my interests. Sure, the line between the two is fuzzy, but I think there is a difference. I love pixel art, and follow a lot of pixel artists. Does that make my feed a "pixel art echo chamber"? I guess so? But that seems to me about as harmless as joining model railroad club.
Does this ever happen? It seems to me like every time someone says something unpopular, the world goes on a witch hunt to destroy that person's life. That's not what I call "constructively challenged". I call it "just short of hanging them, which is what people really want to do."
I'd love to see a world where I could debate a matter with someone without everyone getting so emotionally charged that logic gets thrown out the window, and ideas that are incorrect can be pointed out to a person without everyone hating one another.
Every time I've witnessed a "debate" where people "constructively challenge" people who have opposite views, it ended in a shouting match.
I'm happy to avoid any such "debate." In my experience, the kind of debate you describe tends to happen far more often between people who have (paradoxically?) similar views, and who just like to explore ideas and challenge each other.
That intellectual trait is completely orthogonal to the views themselves. The closest thing I tend to compare it to is the charity principle, but that may not encapsulate everything quite right.
It used to be that you lived next to your neighbor and you had to talk to them or at least acknowledge their humanity even if you disagreed. In the early days we all heralded the internet as ushering an a new era of enlightenment and democracy with freedom of information for everyone.
Of course the reality is that when there was only one nightly television news program, those creators felt some responsibility to report objectively, and no pressure to pander to some demographic. Now, anyone can get any view point they want at any time. There is no value in thoughtful, reasoned opinions because that doesn't resonate with a highly opinionated audience—it's better to be loved or hated than passively respected. You don't have to talk to your neighbor at all because you can literally stare at your phone every time you are outside. No one ever has to hear an opinion they don't like, and when they do they can find their own bespoke mob to initiate a witch hunt.
Technology has enabled us to have a civil war without needing to be divided by a physical border. The tribes can coalesce from arbitrary locations.
There absolutely is, if you have a friend of a friend work there in which case you can get special backchannel treatment and they'll ban whomever tweets something unpleasant at you.
No. Twitter incorrectly used him as some kind of example. They had also did temp bans on him in the past and also the immature move of removing his check mark.
The harassment was happening WELL before Milo was tweeting the ghostbuster. Milo wrote the article. Milo's tweets weren't anywhere NEAR harassment level. Trolling a famous person on twitter is not harassment and brigading. And as many have already shown the ghostbuster herself was just as guilty in the past of attempts at brigading.
There's even some communication from her where she was actually thrilled the incident would give exposure to her and the movie. Whatever people think of this, Milo didn't cause her any suffering or feeling of being 'unsafe' Other harassers were deplorable. Milo was not in that category.
This provides a civilized version of Twitter that is mostly populated by smart and funny people.
So Twitter removed a professional jerk from the Verified streams while allowing him to continue as a rabble-rouser.
Removing Milo's check out of politically-driven spite definitely undermines the validity of the entire verification system.
> Removing Milo's check out of politically-driven spite definitely undermines the validity of the entire verification system.
That sounds like a prejudiced opinion expressed in prejudicial language. However, you might consider this section from I’m With The Banned
https://medium.com/welcome-to-the-scream-room/im-with-the-ba...
QUOTE >>
Milo is excited. This is his night. How does he feel about his suspension?
“It’s fantastic,” he says, “It’s the end of the platform. The timing is perfect.”
He was planning for something like this. “I thought I had another six months, but this was always going to happen.”
Milo shows no remorse for the avalanche of misconduct he helped direct towards Leslie Jones, who is just the latest victim of the recreational ritual abuse he likes to launch at women and minorities for the fame and fun of it.
He shows no remorse because she clearly didn't suffer from anything he said. Like I said before. Other people actually harassed, he didn't. Trolling a celebrity star of a bad movie isn't harassment by any measure. His comments were intelligent and funny. His article on Breitbart was scathing, which is why Jack targeted him, to set an example.
Also stated before, She was happy to leverage it for publicity. So much for being traumatized. And another thing, Milo doesn't launch abuse at Minorities. In fact, since he's in love with british black men, your comment has no value there because you're clearly uninformed on his background.
Milo attacks ideas and does sophisticated trolling. Judging by Twitter's crashing stock price right when this incident occurred, it can't be denied that Twitter's censoring of an minor media celebrity proved it made a bad move. So much so, Jack's been trying to put out the fire, even where he addressed it for a canned question during the investor phone call. He just wants it to go away.
So, you've been suckered by an obvious troll.
> In fact, since he's in love with british black men, your comment has no value there because you're clearly uninformed on his background.
You're funny. OK, answer these questions:
1) Where was Milo born? 2) What was his birth name? 3) What does his father do for a living?
I have another dozen if you get any of those right.
One of us knows Milo and it isn't you ;-)
Twitter circa 2009 before Kutcher vs CNN? This still exists?
I did suggest some time ago that Twitter could monetize by charging a high fee for verification (with, say, passport scans and other personal details). Sadly, they do it free.
Milo had tens of thousands of flying monkeys to troll and harass people on his behalf. He knew this perfectly well, and used it all the time.
His tweets didn't need to be particularly harassing: all he had to do was point the finger. Which he did.
That's an plainly insane rule. How about Twitter actually ban people who actually break the site rules, act with some small measure of maturity, and stop moderating with a political bias that a child could see?
Give $10,000-$25,000 to The Clinton Foundation
http://www.politico.com/blogs/media/2015/05/clinton-foundati...
And thanks to his thuggish role in gamergate, he had plenty of "previous".
What objective facts do you base this on? The tweets themselves are completely innocuous.
And meanwhile, people who post actual harassment and threats are left unscathed (I've personally reported a few myself), and while I'm not privy to what happens in Jack's office, it definitely quacks like it's okay to to harass if you subscribe to one political mindset, but not another.
But then, Milo is just riding Trump, and plenty of Republicans take him seriously as well. (Not all, of course. Some have retained their integrity https://goplifer.com/2016/07/22/resignation-letter/ )
The problem is that people who are being taken for a ride obviously don't know they are being taken for a ride, or they wouldn't be. And they definitely don't want to know that: they'll just get angry. So it's much better not to tell them....
I guess any self-righteous and simple-minded "cause" like #gamergate is likely to attract trolls and misogynists, but my personal experience on Twitter was that it was mainly backed by thick bigots. Of course, YMMV.
Just the sort of crowd that Milo can manipulate. And in his cynical self-aggrandising universe, dupes are there to be manipulated.
Most of what you're hearing is horribly, horribly slanted, if not outright false. Ask yourself why we're supposed to take someone that cries "i'm being harassed!" on faith. Ask yourself why certain prominent individuals have been caught faking harassment directed at themselves.
http://deepfreeze.it - literally every single point of discussion on this site is backed up with a citation, and it provides a very strong, very plausible alternative to the narrative surrounding that movement. I'm not going to say that trolls in there don't exist, but it's not near as significant a component of the group as you've been led to believe.
Not in my personal experience, both of Milo and of Gamergate. Glad to hear you have a different and better experience, but I saw the harassment and thuggery in action.
your claim. I was reading his tweets and you're wrong. It's simple. you don't have a leg to stand on. And thanks to twitter, we don't have the records to look at either. But since I was reading them I know, so I don't have to take your claim into consideration.
If Milo deserved to be banned, then so does 30-40% of Twitter. He did nothing wrong, and certainly nothing worse than this: https://twitter.com/wikileaks/status/756219192878268416
An echo chamber is bad because it not only repeatedly re-broadcasts beliefs, it also amplifies them. "The President is wrong and should be voted out of office" can turn into "The President is wrong and ought to be shot" in an echo chamber environment much faster if there's nobody around to say "wait, hold up, maybe don't."
Note this is NOT shooting out facts, not necessarily a close individual who you've built repoire with, and in fact almost zero talking. AND it persists for at least 3 months!
It's small, but it's also viable and completely different than what most people I know think of when we go out to "change someone's mind."
[Nolan 2010]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Inception
P.S. Sorry... couldn't resist ;)
Are you implying that social media created Donald Trump?
My friends and I can change each other's minds quite often, by approaching arguments from their own rubric. For example, by drawing an analogy between the topic of discussion and one of their deeply held views, exposing some dissonance.
But it takes time, empathy, and understanding. Which is to say I doubt it ever happens on the internet.
It helps that I'm not employed in software engineering, so I have a degree of humility. Well, a little.
The rules are: Don't believe anything that isn't substantiated, Do be open to new ideas, but don't be afraid to question them, and don't be afraid to re-evaluate your position. After all, your ideas deserve as much skepticism as anybody else's.
That's like saying someone who comes up with a bunch of scientific hypotheses and never tests them should have more confidence in them than someone who does. Holding on to your beliefs even in the face of evidence/arguments to the contrary is not a sign of having better or more considered beliefs, it's a sign of arrogance. If you truly think that you're never wrong about anything so there is no reason to even look for contrary data, that is especially arrogant.
Rational arguments, a bit of rhetorical ability, and persistence are surprisingly effective. The problem is the persistence part requires multiple interactions over months or years, so it's hard to study.
You won't charge their mind, but maybe you won't see each other in such negative light for what each person believes.
Sure those changes are generational as people don't get their opinion changed easily.
But allowing these discussion to take place freely especially amongst the youth is essential to let them shape their world.
So you want to change someone's opinion, but not going to allow someone to change yours?
I guess we'll end up with a conservative twitter clone, and a liberal twitter, and no-one will ever face the "danger" of seeing viewpoints they disagree with.
I think the difference behind the political fireworks is this: conservatives already revel in sub-communities like churches where they can protect themselves from unwanted speech. Progressives are starting to dominate open places like universities to the extent that they want the same privilege there.
1. Not leftist
2. In EuropeBoth want freedom of speech sometimes and both want to be able to block out dissenting voices at others.
The trick is finding a balance. Too big of an echochamber can be unhealthy, too small of one and little discussion about core beliefs gets discussed (everything gets sidetracked by the dissenters).
Young conservatives definitely seem to be outnumbered online, and I've seen them put up walls so they can discuss their beliefs without being constantly picked apart by people with alternative beliefs.
So I think the divide on ideological lines is unrealistic. Just human nature (good and bad).
As a live-right-now example, the mods of /r/The_Donald on Reddit are preemtively banning users before Trump's AMA to prevent dissent, and have stated plainly they will delete any unflattering questions.
You're example is false equivalency. And what you call a preemptive ban, you'll actually discover that they are quite used to being brigaded on that subreddit and they know who participates. And bans aren't necessarily permanent there.
Having rules that say "we don't value free speech or discourse" doesn't excuse them.
Also, reddit allows you to subscribe, but twitter creates a stronger relationship between poster and followers. You'd be subscribed to a particular person but when they are banned, all their history is gone, you no longer see anything. It's like someone came into your house and took away one of your favorite TV channels, as well as anything you had recorded from that channel on your DVR.
Who is this THEY you keep referring to anyway? You keep saying 'they' like readers are just supposed to know.
http://www.theamericanconservative.com/articles/free-speech-...
No, they weren't. They were authoritarian conservatives. (In the US, there's often a confusion between "conservative" and "libertarian", and if you confuse those and assume anything that isn't libertarian must be progressive, I can see how you'd make that mistake, but Bush/Cheney is about as far from progressive as you can get.)
> Conservatives and libertarians have criticized Bush for greatly increased domestic spending, creating a new entitlement program for prescription drugs, failing to veto a single bill, and expanding both the size and scope of government
What are you talking about?
And a "privately-owned platform" that is open to the public, used by a nontrivial amount of people, advertised by the owners as a place for public discussion, quoted in the media, etc etc etc isn't so "private" anymore.
Hmm. I'd like to hear those arguments, since by itself the notion doesn't sound particularly compelling.
It's a problem with freedom of speech and private property in general, and why some people have considered the idea of treating large social platforms as closer to utilities rather than businesses.
No, they're not. They're the ones saying that people shouldn't be allowed to protest many things like Chik-Fil-A's support of gay marriage bans, protesting police departments that act like black lives don't matter, etc.
Citation needed.
I don't like him or think like him, but it's sure fun to have a firsthand view on the dumpster fire that is the 2016 election.
That is by no means safe, when brigaders are actively looking for opportunities for whipping up a mob.
Basically, you'd get the same experience by having an email list of your friends.
I refer of course to the Milo Yiannopoulos situation (edit: I said the article didn't mention. I missed the mention.). The man deserved what he got, but there are dozens of accounts that were his "executors" - doing the actual harassment for him in many cases - who got off scot-free, while he remains banned. There is no consistency.
I think there's a possibility that the arbitrary enforcement is partially because Twitter knows that if it were consistent in enforcing its own rules, so much of its population of users would disappear that it would be hobbling itself.
The only "safe" way to use Twitter now is as an echo chamber - only follow people you like, only talk to people who think the same way you do. That's a waste.