Will India Ban Twitter?

Re:Will India Ban Twitter? by qart on Friday February 05, 2021 @12:17PM (#26038622)

Indian. I resisted getting a twitter account all these years, but created one just to keep track of the pandemic. As far as I can tell, Indian political parties and "news" outlets have completely gamed the system. Every day, there would be a new outrage hashtag. And by no means are these outrages driven by one political faction. Over the last one year, I notice that Twitter itself has taken steps to limit the "trending" hashtags. Since 2021, I see just one or two such hashtags on the homepage.

With all this outrage generated on Twitter, I really wonder how much of a role Twitter is playing in incitement(s). Would I be sad to see Twitter go? To some extent... there are some great people I follow on Twitter. But the platform itself, I tend to see as a force of evil.

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Re:Will India Ban Twitter? by creaghpatr on Friday February 05, 2021 @12:22PM (#26038688)

>As far as I can tell, Indian political parties and "news" outlets have completely gamed the system. Every day, there would be a new outrage hashtag. And by no means are these outrages driven by one political faction. Over the last one year, I notice that Twitter itself has taken steps to limit the "trending" hashtags. Since 2021, I see just one or two such hashtags on the homepage.

It's exactly like that in America too.

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Re:Will India Ban Twitter? by _jgdh on Friday February 05, 2021 @12:32PM (#26038815)

For an example of how "one political faction" can manufacture trends, check this out - https://twitter.com/Kirangandhi/status/1188354450458468352. They contact famous personalities (in this case athletes who had represented India at the Olympics), give them a text ("I thank @narendramodi for his initiative to honour and empower...") and ask them all to tweet it at the same time. Then they use their vast network of fake accounts to amplify it. Same thing yesterday, when they requested cricket players with large followings to implicitly criticise Greta Thunberg and Rihanna for "interfering" in India's affairs.

It's so easy to co-opt this too. One person got access to the shared google doc where they store the next tweets that need to be trending and changed it to something critical of Modi. It was promptly tweeted out regardless by government ministers who said "working for the middle class is low on the agenda of Modi Govt" and "Modi govt has not made inclusive development as the focal point".

(https://twitter.com/free_thinker/status/1095571793233043456?...)

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Re:Will India Ban Twitter? by l0k3ndr on Friday February 05, 2021 @12:40PM (#26038920)

True that. Daily you wake up and you see powerplay of tweeting trends. Accounts trying to just use their followers to build a wave of trends and then people against them doing the same.

It's not the number of tweets that should build a trend, but number of authentic facts that is backing it up. I wish there was a platform which shows facts leading up to a certain tweet - for both sides. So that immediately, I can compare the reality.

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Re:Will India Ban Twitter? by nonamechicken on Friday February 05, 2021 @12:45PM (#26038998)

>But the platform itself, I tend to see as a force of evil.

Exactly my thoughts the last couple of weeks. I think world would be a much better place if platforms like Twitter or Facebook doesn't exist. All they are doing now is spreading hatred and divisiveness in our societies, be it USA or India. I left Facebook back in 2012. And quit Twitter & Reddit for good this week.

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