• Activity
  • Votes
  • Comments
  • New
  • All activity
    • Showing only topics with the tag "twitter". Back to normal view

    16. What does the online / social media world look like to you, what would you want?

      ~talk Text 462 words
      Some of you may have heard that Google+ will be shutting down in August, 2019. Though much criticised (including by me), the site offered some compelling dynamics, and I've reflected a lot on...

      Some of you may have heard that Google+ will be shutting down in August, 2019. Though much criticised (including by me), the site offered some compelling dynamics, and I've reflected a lot on those.

      I'm involved in the effort to find new homes for Plussers and Communities, which has become something of an excuse to explore and redefine what "online" and "social" media are ("PlexodusWiki").

      Part of this involves some frankly embarrassing attempts to try to define what social media is, and what its properties are (both topics reflected heavily in the recent-changes section of the wiki above).

      Tildes is ... among the potential target sites (there are a few Plussers, some of whom I really appreciated knowing and hearing from there), here, though the site dynamics make discovering and following them hard. This site is evolving its own culture and dynamics, parts of which I'm becoming aware of.

      I've been online for well over 30 years, and discovered my first online communities via Unix talk, email, FTP, and Usenet, as well as (no kidding) a computerised university library catalogue system. Unsurprisingly: if you provide a way, especially for bright and precocious minds to interact with one another, they will. I've watched several evolutions of Internet and Web, now increasing App-based platforms. There are differences, but also similarities and patterns emerging. Lessons from previous eras of television, radio, telephony, telegraphy, print, writing, oral traditions, and more, can be applied.

      I've got far more questions than answers and thought I'd put a few out here:

      • What does online or social media mean to you? Is it all user-generated content platforms? Web only? Apps? Email or chat? Wikis? GitHub, GitLab, and StackExchange?

      • Is social networking as exemplified by Facebook or Twitter net good or bad? Why? If bad, how might you fix it? Or is it time to simply retreat?

      • What properties or characteristics would you use to specify, define, or distinguish social or online media?

      • What emergent properties -- site dynamics, if you will -- are positive or negative? What are those based on?

      • What are the positive and negative aspects of scale?

      • What risks would you consider in self-hosting either your own or a group's online presence?

      • What is/was the best online community experience you've had? What characterised it? How did it form? How did it fail (if it did)?

      • What elements would comprise your ideal online experience?

      • What would you nuke from orbit, after takeoff, just to be sure?

      • Are you or your group seeking new options or platforms? What process / considerations do you have?

      I could keep going and will regret not adding other questions, but this is a good start. Feel free to suggest other dimensions, though some focus on what I've prompted with would be appreciated.

      19 votes

    17. Good use for Twitter?

      ~tech Ask (survey)
      I hear a lot about how Twitter is a bad concept, because the character limit means things can be oversimplified, taken out of context, and posted without a source. I've never used it myself, but...

      I hear a lot about how Twitter is a bad concept, because the character limit means things can be oversimplified, taken out of context, and posted without a source. I've never used it myself, but recently I've been wondering if it can be useful to me. For example, some bloggers I follow might post some insights on Twitter that they don't anywhere else, and help me discover other interesting blogs.

      Have you found a good use for Twitter besides as a social network or news aggregator?

      13 votes

    22. Belgium has regional elections on Sunday, voting machines use USB sticks and store votes on a Linux partition which users will be prompted to format when using Windows, deleting all the votes

      ~tech Tweet

      @rubenvanassche: Belgium has it's regional elections this sunday, the voting machines are using USB sticks and store the votes on a separate Linux partition. But the stick should also be used on windows which wil ask the users to format it and so it will delete all the votes. 😮

      32 votes

    29. BBC investigation of Cameroon killings

      ~news Tweet

      @bbcafrica: THREAD In July 2018, a horrifying video began to circulate on social media. 2 women & 2 young children are led away by a group of soldiers. They are blindfolded, forced to the ground, and shot 22 times. #BBCAfricaEye investigated this atrocity. This is what we found...

      17 votes