I suspect it's the same reason that Dorsey appears on stage in a "#staywoke" t-shirt while Twitter's PAC maxes out their donation to Mitch McConnell -- for all Twitter's talk, they're a thoroughly...
Why the fuck does Richard Spencer still have a Twitter account?
I suspect it's the same reason that Dorsey appears on stage in a "#staywoke" t-shirt while Twitter's PAC maxes out their donation to Mitch McConnell -- for all Twitter's talk, they're a thoroughly amoral company, and that begins at the top. And for their platform, hate = engagement.
Yeah, that was my impression as well. It seems like he's going on a charm offensive, starting with this interview, probably hoping it'll all blow over, then they can announce "we changed the heart...
Yeah, that was my impression as well. It seems like he's going on a charm offensive, starting with this interview, probably hoping it'll all blow over, then they can announce "we changed the heart back to a star! everything is fixed now..."
I mean, it's not like there is much effort to do in looking at where things are going wrong. They can change all the buttons they want but if the core business remain the same, nothing gonna...
As at other tech companies, Twitter’s software algorithms seek to serve users the content they’re most likely to want to see.
I mean, it's not like there is much effort to do in looking at where things are going wrong.
They can change all the buttons they want but if the core business remain the same, nothing gonna change anyway.
I find the way that Mastodon (and pleroma, and the wider fediverse) aims to solve this issue very interesting: you solve moderation by greatly increasing the moderator:user ratio (largely due to...
I find the way that Mastodon (and pleroma, and the wider fediverse) aims to solve this issue very interesting: you solve moderation by greatly increasing the moderator:user ratio (largely due to most instances having a few hundred people at most), and by allowing people to self-sort. People want a free-speech, everything goes instance? make one. You're likely to be blocked/unfederated from most leftist, more tightly moderated instances, and that's absolutely fine.
The other bigger way, which might be less obvious, is keeping the chronologic timelines. Anger is the best predictor of how quickly something is shared (which on sites like twitter = pushed to the top by the algorithms), so the very nature of having some sort of sorting based on how popular something is means you'll see more angry, divisive messages. Of course a purely chronologic timeline will be subject to the same issues (think more people talking angrily) but taking the algorithm, the importance/engagement ranking out of it means you'll have less of it. Want to rethink how Twitter works? Make it less profitable. That seems to be the better solution right now.
You mention federation as a solution to the hate issue, but the article also mentions breaking up filter bubbles. If you just federate and block other views than your own, that makes the whole...
You mention federation as a solution to the hate issue, but the article also mentions breaking up filter bubbles. If you just federate and block other views than your own, that makes the whole thing more of an echo chamber not less.
But I agree that the business model of selling your attention is at the root of the problem.
In the federated case, it's at least an echo chamber of your own design, and one you can chose to leave on your own terms. There's often great value in having a close group of very like minded...
In the federated case, it's at least an echo chamber of your own design, and one you can chose to leave on your own terms.
There's often great value in having a close group of very like minded people, but that's very different than joining an ostensibly "open" platform like FB or Twitter and having that platform decide for you that you should be surrounded with people and news that best reinforce your most click-inducing emotions.
Twitter was a mistake. The very structure of the thing encourages abuse and negativity, and Twitter won’t be able to hire enough help to reverse or fight against the very structure of the thing...
Twitter was a mistake. The very structure of the thing encourages abuse and negativity, and Twitter won’t be able to hire enough help to reverse or fight against the very structure of the thing they created. The sooner it is obliterated, the sooner society can rethink how individuals can conveniently communicate.
I suspect it's the same reason that Dorsey appears on stage in a "#staywoke" t-shirt while Twitter's PAC maxes out their donation to Mitch McConnell -- for all Twitter's talk, they're a thoroughly amoral company, and that begins at the top. And for their platform, hate = engagement.
Yeah, that was my impression as well. It seems like he's going on a charm offensive, starting with this interview, probably hoping it'll all blow over, then they can announce "we changed the heart back to a star! everything is fixed now..."
With consistency, regardless of the target of hate! THAT is the most important part, in my opinion.
Can you start by not having the like and retweet buttons do the same thing?
I mean, it's not like there is much effort to do in looking at where things are going wrong.
They can change all the buttons they want but if the core business remain the same, nothing gonna change anyway.
I find the way that Mastodon (and pleroma, and the wider fediverse) aims to solve this issue very interesting: you solve moderation by greatly increasing the moderator:user ratio (largely due to most instances having a few hundred people at most), and by allowing people to self-sort. People want a free-speech, everything goes instance? make one. You're likely to be blocked/unfederated from most leftist, more tightly moderated instances, and that's absolutely fine.
The other bigger way, which might be less obvious, is keeping the chronologic timelines. Anger is the best predictor of how quickly something is shared (which on sites like twitter = pushed to the top by the algorithms), so the very nature of having some sort of sorting based on how popular something is means you'll see more angry, divisive messages. Of course a purely chronologic timeline will be subject to the same issues (think more people talking angrily) but taking the algorithm, the importance/engagement ranking out of it means you'll have less of it. Want to rethink how Twitter works? Make it less profitable. That seems to be the better solution right now.
You mention federation as a solution to the hate issue, but the article also mentions breaking up filter bubbles. If you just federate and block other views than your own, that makes the whole thing more of an echo chamber not less.
But I agree that the business model of selling your attention is at the root of the problem.
In the federated case, it's at least an echo chamber of your own design, and one you can chose to leave on your own terms.
There's often great value in having a close group of very like minded people, but that's very different than joining an ostensibly "open" platform like FB or Twitter and having that platform decide for you that you should be surrounded with people and news that best reinforce your most click-inducing emotions.
Twitter was a mistake. The very structure of the thing encourages abuse and negativity, and Twitter won’t be able to hire enough help to reverse or fight against the very structure of the thing they created. The sooner it is obliterated, the sooner society can rethink how individuals can conveniently communicate.