Slashdot Mirror

← Back to Stories (view on slashdot.org)

Did Twitter Exec Censor #WhichHillary In Advance of Sunday Fundraiser, Key Primary? (dailykos.com)

Posted by yaelk on from the #whichhillary dept.

An anonymous reader writes with the key claim of a story at The Daily Kos: In a truly egregious move yesterday, Twitter suspended the account responsible for #WhichHillary, activist @GuerrillaDems. Twitter also removed #WhichHillary from trending status, which is odd, considering the hashtag received more than 450,000 tweets in less than 24 hours. Twitter now says the suspension of @GuerillaDems was a mistake. Although this may just be a coincidence, it isn't the first time Twitter has exerted political control. Many users think it is a demonstrable conflict of interest, in light of Twitter Executive Chairman Omid Kordestani's Sunday, 2/28 fundraiser with Clinton. The Daily Kos itself offers at least a perfunctory caution that it's unclear "whether it was intentional removal, or algorithmic coincidence."

4 of 172 comments (clear)

  1. It is intentional by NaCh0 · · Score: 5, Informative

    Twitter also scrubbed #JeSiusMilo when they unverified Milo Yiannopoulos from Breitbart.

    1. Re:It is intentional by Crashmarik · · Score: 5, Informative

      LOL you're full of crap. If Twitter wanted to prevent abuse they wouldn't have put Sarkeesian other abusers and doxers on the council. I can't imagine the level of mental gymnastics it took to overlook this.

      Lets talk R.S. McCain here

      https://reason.com/blog/2016/0...

  2. now you see my true form by Pseudonymous+Powers · · Score: 5, Insightful

    A: Okay, Twitter is going to be a beacon of free speech. We're not going to censor it in any way, and we're going to fight anyone who attempts to like hell.

    B: Great! I agree. This is going to be a great site!

    A: Uh, okay, people are pretending to be other people for purposes of satire. We should probably add some sort of verification so that people can know tell the real person's account from the joke ones.

    B: Makes sense.

    A: Right, now let's just shut down those joke accounts, to minimize confusion.

    B: Uh... wait.

    A: And a bunch of people are being mean to other people. We'll just shut that down as well.

    B: But--but--

    A: Now, that may be unpopular, so we'd better organize a committee made up entirely of people on a single side of the political spectrum to decide who gets to speak and who doesn't.

    B: Now just hold on a min--

    A: Oh, and according to our committee, all the people on the other side of the political spectrum are the ones being mean. We'll just ban them outright.

    B: [censored]

    A: Actually, why don't we just start censoring things all the time for no reason, with no real justification or even a discernible pattern.

  3. Did Twitter Exec Censor #WhichHillary? by fizzup · · Score: 5, Interesting

    Yes.