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posted by
CoolHand
on Tuesday February 21 2017, @03:35AM
from the will-they-crack-down-on-el-presidente dept.
from the will-they-crack-down-on-el-presidente dept.
Submitted via IRC for TheMightyBuzzard
Twitter has launched a new way to punish users for bad behavior, temporarily "limiting" their account.
Some users are receiving notices their accounts are limited for 12 hours, meaning only people who follow them can see their tweets or receive notifications. When they are retweeted, people outside their network can't see those retweets.
Some speculate these limitations are automatic based on keywords, but there is no hard evidence.
This would be fine if this was used uniformly to clamp down on harassment, but it appears to be used on people, simply for using politically incorrect language.
Source: http://heatst.com/tech/twitters-new-tool-to-crack-down-on-politically-incorrect-language/
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Twitter's New Tool to Crack Down on Politically Incorrect Language
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(Score: 3, Insightful) by NotSanguine on Tuesday February 21 2017, @07:49AM
Well, as with everything, it depends on context. I completely agree with you that if you dislike Twitter's policy, you should encourage people to stop using the service. But Twitter is also still a private company, so their rules are their rules. If you come into my house and start using offensive language in front of a kid or something, I may also ask you to censor your language, and if you don't do so, I may ask you to leave. I'm not trying "protect" my kid from offensive speech; I just still believe there can be such a thing as "decorum" and "appropriate time and place" for speech.
Your point is well taken. However, just because I'm anti-censorship, that doesn't mean I ignore context or am disdainful of decorum. I am generally both polite and respectful to those around me, and will generally accede to any request you might make in your space (or even in a public space under most circumstances).
However, I find your analogy to be flawed WRT Twitter. Twitter absolutely has the right to limit and/or censor speech as little or as much as they like. It is, after all, their infrastructure.
That said, their platform is specifically designed to allow the public dissemination of speech. By limiting/censoring that speech, they insult their users' intelligence and degrade the free flow of information and ideas. Given their willingness to do so, I want nothing to do with them and urge others to take a similar stance. If enough people do so, they will need to stop censoring or go out of business.
No one needs to use Twitter. Nor do I need to come to your house if I am unwilling to not to curse in front of your kids, put the toilet seat down after using your plumbing, or do anything else you might require of me when I am in your space.
No, no, you're not thinking; you're just being logical. --Niels Bohr
(Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Tuesday February 21 2017, @02:46PM
"they insult their users' intelligence and degrade the free flow of information and ideas."
Thank you. Additionally, it brings Twitter's staff's intelligence into question.
(Score: 2) by AthanasiusKircher on Tuesday February 21 2017, @05:10PM
However, I find your analogy to be flawed WRT Twitter. Twitter absolutely has the right to limit and/or censor speech as little or as much as they like. It is, after all, their infrastructure.
That said, their platform is specifically designed to allow the public dissemination of speech.
Actually, I'm pretty sure "their platform is specifically designed" to make them money. I have absolutely no faith that Twitter, Facebook, or any other big online platform is in any way committed to "public dissemination of speech." They are trying to MAKE MONEY. And if they decide censorship will be better at making them money (or allow them to lose less money due to scandals around bad stuff said on their platform of whatever), I'm absolutely certainly they'll eventually choose what will allow them to MAKE MONEY.
The reason to leave Twitter and Facebook and all the other crap isn't this new censorship policy -- it's that commercial platforms like this will ALWAYS be beholden to other goals. Arguing about the morality of their censorship policy ignores the elephant in the room, i.e., what's REALLY driving their decisions (and it certainly isn't detailed philosophical debates about the nature of free expression on the internet).