onfocus

"Even if academic Twitter ends up largely moving to Mastodon, the big question is whether the general public will move there, too, allowing scientists to communicate with more than just each other. “When I tweet, I’m talking to my neighbor and the person in the grocery store and the teenager who is thinking about studying science in college,” Fiesler says. “That’s the beauty of scientists on social media.”"

My wife signed up for Mastodon yesterday to follow covid researchers. She doesn’t post, isn’t a scientist, and just wants to follow experts having public conversations. That’s just one data point but I think people will move to where conversations are happening. And if that conversation environment doesn’t also have to feed the advertising machine it could be healthier.

"Many of us with larger presences on the platform have seen a significant drop in our follower counts as people make good on their threat to exit. This is, of course, as much their right as it is Musk’s to buy the platform and run it as he pleases. But I think leaving is a mistake."

LOL I have to admit there is some Schadenfreude happening at this moment. Social media has been so awful for so long. Let me have this.

"Twitter is a disaster clown car company that is successful despite itself, and there is no possible way to grow users and revenue without making a series of enormous compromises that will ultimately destroy your reputation and possibly cause grievous damage to your other companies."

It's like a heroin addict thought his best move would be buying the entire heroin supply chain. Congrats, now you have an addiction AND all the problems of being in the drug trade. But Musk's personal disaster aside, does every online social space need to be run by a weirdo right wing authoritarian? That seems bad for everyone.

"Salma al-Shehab, a Saudi student living in the UK and attending Leeds University, was sentenced to 34 years in prison for having a Twitter account and following and retweeting dissidents and activists. She was arrested and convicted after returning home for a holiday."

Saudi Arabia partnered with Elon Musk to become the 2nd largest investor in Twitter. It doesn’t look like Musk is building a free speech platform.

"Twitter making a significant donation to any political committee in 2022 is unusual. Twitter shut down its PAC in 2020 and has subsequently avoided making any political donations. Now the company is supporting a group that is seeking to revoke reproductive rights nationally, even as Twitter has quietly adopted a policy to help employees to access abortion care."

Quite a way to get back into political giving at this particular moment in time. Garbage fire.

”Amplification of moral outrage is a clear consequence of social media’s business model, which optimizes for user engagement,” Crockett said…She added, “Our data show that social media platforms do not merely reflect what is happening in society. Platforms create incentives that change how users react to political events over time.”

The "we are merely passive mirrors showing society as it is" argument is BS. I recommend that people switch to blogging which has next to zero engagement. This void encourages you to maintain existing levels of outrage. But seriously, a primary by-product of Facebook and Twitter are trolls.

"Twitter is a parasite that burrows deep into your brain, training you to respond to the constant social feedback of likes and retweets. That takes only a week or two. Human psychology is pathetically simple to manipulate. Once you’re hooked, the parasite becomes your master, and it changes the way you think."

Sure Twitter took away their love of reading, but it gave them outrage and a sense of righteousness in return. Fair trade?

"Think strategically about how you want to allocate your attention. Many of the worst people on the Internet wake up every morning to hijack your attention. They want to use your outrage to build their brand and amass political power. Denying them the engagement they so desperately crave is how we fight back against the politics of 'owning the libs.'"

Trolling works. I appreciate the appeal here but I believe this approach takes the pressure off of platforms. Twitter and Facebook et al should be improving and enforcing their policies to stop disinformation. Sure, we can always do better as individuals, but the people who run large social media platforms have been mostly absent.

"The business choices of internet platforms have enabled an explosion not only of white supremacy but also of Covid denial and antivax extremism, which have variously undermined the nation’s pandemic response, nearly sabotaged the presidential election, and played a foundational role in the violence at the Capitol. A huge industry has evolved on the platform giants to raise money from and sell products to people in the thrall of extreme ideologies."

Also, their monopoly power means no meaningful alternatives can exist for businesses who want to advertise or people who want to socialize on platforms that act ethically.

"Americans voted Trump out of office, but instead of accepting that result, he has sought to overturn it. By inciting the violent occupation of the US Capitol, Trump has given up any legitimate claim to power. In 14 days, barring catastrophe, he will be out of office. The only question is how much damage he will do in the meantime — and we know, based on long experience, that his Twitter and Facebook accounts will be among his primary weapons."

Taking away some ability to incite violence would be a good step.

Update (1/7): Facebook bans Trump for his remaining time in office right after congress confirmed the electoral college votes and the Georgia election determined Democrats would control Congress.

Update (1/9): Twitter permanently bans Trump. And all attempts to use related accounts.

"Though this adds some extra friction for those who simply want to Retweet, we hope it will encourage everyone to not only consider why they are amplifying a Tweet, but also increase the likelihood that people add their own thoughts, reactions and perspectives to the conversation."

This. But seriously, happy to see Twitter adding some friction to the system to slow misinformation. If friction helps the system during an election, why not all the time?

Matt Haughey on social media trolls:

“Every bad thing at MetaFilter happened with someone who had been testing the rules for a year or two,” he said. “Those are the ones who tend to blossom into super-trolls over time. They’ll see what they can get away with, they’ll figure out what the limits are, and just stay a step inside. It can go on forever. And when you inevitably break and say, this is a bad idea, they freak out, and try to play the victim.”

Good for Twitter for starting to enforce their terms at this late hour. I can imagine a world where they enforced their terms all along and it makes me disappointed and angry.