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Twitter Employee Blamed For Deleting President Donald Trump's Account (npr.org)
A reader shares an NPR report: With the push of a button, an employee at Twitter accomplished for a brief few minutes on Thursday what President Trump's closest advisors have reportedly been trying unsuccessfully to do for months: shut down the seemingly never-ending tweet stream at @realDonaldTrump. Perhaps it was an act of civil disobedience, or maybe just a "take this job and shove it" moment, but shortly before 7 p.m., the president's personal account kicked back the error message "does not exist." By 7:03 p.m., it was up and running again and within about a half-hour, new presidential tweets were forthcoming. The folks at Twitter leapt into action to find out what had happened: "Earlier today @realdonaldtrump's account was inadvertently deactivated due to human error by a Twitter employee. The account was down for 11 minutes, and has since been restored. We are continuing to investigate and are taking steps to prevent this from happening again," the company said in a statement. Two hours later, the company said, "Through our investigation we have learned that this was done by a Twitter customer support employee who did this on the employee's last day."
Where your data can get deleted by a click of a button by a disgruntled employee and even the fucking president of the United States can't be spared nor can his data be restored in less than 11 minutes.
Imagine if you weren't the president, would they even care?
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What we've discovered is that Twitter CSRs can whack any account whenever they want, for whatever reason they want. They have no real oversight whatsoever, so when this juvy decided to do something they just did it and left the building.
Besides being an asshole move, it shows a distinct lack of internal controls.
So somehow reporting that someone shut down Trump's twitter account is Trump bashing? It's a simple matter of fact.
Oh that's right - I forgot. Any facts that you guys don't like are fake news/someone's agenda/whatever so you don't have to face them.
Let me tell you something, my friend. Reality doesn't give two shits what you think about it.
Weaselmancer
rediculous.
This is the $64,000 question right here. Twitter has been actively censoring viewpoints they don't like and there is literally no oversight. 1984 memory holes are alive and well at Twitter.
And why do any of you give a rat's ass?
It's a business - not the government. They have no obligation to freedom of speech or any other freedoms.
That's what none of you are getting. If anyone thinks that Twitter, reddit, Slashdot, facebook or whatever has a legal obligation to free speech, you are horribly misinformed.
No, the real question is why they restored it so quickly. I would have loved having a week or two without having to hear about the latest Trump rant on CNN.
The amazing part of this episode is that Twitter discovered the disgruntled employee's action and rectified it in 11 minutes. How did they find out so quickly? Either the employee bragged or the action set off a trip wire, meaning that particular account was closely monitored by Twitter. I doubt that even the White House would be able to get Twitter to act so quickly once POTUS or his staff discovered that the account was broken.
1. That's not how free speech rights work. You are protected from the GOVERNMENT preventing you from speaking. This is a private company. They can censor anything they like (including the president, although they might have to retain his tweets, because of legal reasons).
2. I'd really like to understand your logic for how a service that depends on other mediums for transmission could possibly be a "common-carrier". They don't provide service. They aren't a telephone company. They aren't a wireless company.
As a note, the reason for the Fairness Doctrine being removed was Cable News like CNN. The Fairness Doctrine was intended to make sure everyone had a voice on the big three channels. With Cable, people aren't locked in to ABC, NBC, or CBS. You can get news from CNN or any other company that can get a cable presence. Then with the 'net, there are even more options with FoxNews and lots and lots of other sites like BBC and Al Jazeera.
The problem with this though is folks start to gravitate to their bubbles. Don't like hearing a Conservative or Liberal spin on the news? There are sites that cater just to your ideology. You don't hear other viewpoints and worse, the viewpoints you do hear are much stronger. And even worse are News Aggregators like the ones on devices (phones and tablets) and like Facebook where they're weighing what you click on and configuring your feed to give you more of what you indicate you like enough to read. Without a conscious effort to go to alternate sites, you get into a feedback loop.
Over the years I've found myself getting into that loop and having to work at broadening my news to include sites outside my ideology. The bad part are the aggregation sites aren't good at providing just news. I'll go to different sites and then have the "For You" sites include opinions that can be quite offensive, to the point that I have to block them from my views.
[John]
Shit better not happen!
I would have loved having a week or two without having to hear about the latest Trump rant on CNN.
Then maybe you should watch less CNN. Do you really think that their non-stop anti-Trump ranting is in any way going to be modified by whether or not he's just tweeted something? If they can go on for a solid day about which shoes his wife wears on the way to get on an airplane, your hopes for them shutting up their one-note editorial focus for a week or two because of ANY change in communication method by Trump is just a silly fantasy.
Don't disappoint your bird dog. Go to the range.
Oh, deleting accounts of blacks and gays is acceptable? I seem to remember a recent court case about a wedding cake for a gay wedding that LEGALLY decided differently.
Good to know racism and sexism is ok, as long as you are a private company. Thanks for sticking up for racists!
Loads. I hear about it from their friends on Twitter all the time. Never seen one get restore this fast though. Usually its weeks, or the user just gives up and creates a new account.
Arguably in this case, the account in question has in fact violated twitter's TOS repeatedly. Its been making death threats and bullying other twitter users even today after restoration. If it was anybody BUT the POTUS it would have been shut off long ago.
Oh, deleting accounts of blacks and gays is acceptable? I seem to remember a recent court case about a wedding cake for a gay wedding that LEGALLY decided differently.
Good to know racism and sexism is ok, as long as you are a private company. Thanks for sticking up for racists!
Yes, I will stick up for racists. One has every right to be a racist, bigot or whatever. They have a right to speak their mind. But we also have the right to not listen to him - to censor him: tell him to get off of private property for instance, like a website.
Now, does the racist have a right to walk into a synagogue and start pontificating of the evils of Jews? Nope.
Does Twitter or any other media outlet have to allow the Nazi to share his views? Nope.
Do you have a right to tell him to STFU? Yep.
Does the government have a right to tell him to STFU? Nope.
Yeah, this. It's probably the most famous Twitter account, which happens to be a technology firm, so News for Nerds kind of qualifies. I don't think TFS is very biased either, it's quite factual. The only thing it fails to mention is if said rogue employee will be charged, but I'd be amazed if they aren't...
Jail time incoming for this illegal misuse of corporate services and computers.
That is extremely unlikely to happen. If a user cannot sue Twitter for deleting his account, who is going to bother with the ex-employee?
As far as "illegal misuse", this employee was apparrently granted access to manage user accounts. Unless he circumvented security measures to get that access, he didn't break the law. Firing an employee for misuse is certainly reasonable, but Twitter doesn't need to bother if he already left the company.
I anticipate no legal consequences. Is 11 minutes without Twitter even justification for a torte?
Another libtard is about to realise the world isn't like their faggy echo-chamber they create for themselves.
Ah, so we have a reason for your rush to authoritative, punitive judgment: partisan politics.
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According to the latest ruleset, this post should be modded as Vorpal Flamebait +5.
I never hear of these so-called "Trump rants". I don't watch CNN or any TV news outlets. (All the stories are virtually the same. It's just the characters, the places, or the causes/issues that are different. That's all. I ignored the Media for 6 months once, on purpose, and then listened again. Every story was the same just different characters, places, and clauses/issues. Just the same bovine scat. Like in the "Casablanca" film, at the end, when the Vichy French officer instructs his junior police officers to round up the "usual suspects". American Politics is exactly the same -- just a drama to keep the uninformed from living their lives. These sycophants want all the attention focused on theirselves but they don't desire it. But you have fallen into the Trap!)
>> this was done by a Twitter customer support employee who did this on the employee's last day.
Was it their last day before they did it?
I'm glad you see things so black and white. I completely agree that some random religion's website is completely theirs to screw with. Twitter is not a religion, it is a company with a corporate charter. They get economic perks like tax incentives and limited liability. They are hugely influential in our national discussion. I think the public/private line is sufficiently blurred that the analogy begins to fail. If Twitter decides to tilt the decision a certain direction, it has a large impact on society. I think they probably should be able to pick and choose the kind of information that appears on their site, but then they cannot run and hide behind "common carrier" type arguments when it is convenient for them. Short of illegal posts, they become editors when they pick and choose what appears on their site.
W..w..W - Willy Waterloo washes Warren Wiggins who is washing Waldo Woo.
No one has enough followers that deleting their account would actually matter. Deleting the whole of Twitter would not matter except that it would probably make the world a better place.
Every story was the same just different characters, places, and clauses/issues. Just the same bovine scat. Like in the "Casablanca" film, at the end, when the Vichy French officer instructs his junior police officers to round up the "usual suspects". American Politics is exactly the same -- just a drama to keep the uninformed from living their lives.
That's because most "news" has to be entertaining, in order to attract people's attention and keep it long enough to expose them to an ad, ask them for a pledge, or persuade them their tax money is well spent (depending on what country you're in). So they broadcast most often what they think is going to grab the most attention.
There's actually two kinds of news. The first kind you watch only because your job depends on it. This news is boring: farming reports, commodity news, financial news and market reports, that kind of thing. You won't see Trump's Tweets there, but unless you have some reason to watch/read/listen to this stuff, you won't.
Then there's the other news that you watch because it's at least part-way entertaining. Informative, sure, but politics, disasters, and videos of kittens being rescued from a tree are all entertaining, and the people in these businesses are in competition with each other to get more viewers. They all look the same? No surprise - in media and politics, you tend to work the same formula that succeeded in the past. FWIW, Trump's Tweets attracts attention, so infotainment news splashes them up like they're the next damn moon landing. Followed by an important message from Polident denture cleaner (keeps your teeth from being stinky and gross). Mission accomplished.
Take it easy, Charlie, I've got an Angle...
*Wishing* everyone had access to food, shelter, and healthcare while doing nothing except whining on the internet to give anyone any of those things makes you a liberal, yes.
Shutting down free speech with violence while wearing masks and literal blackshirts is not fighting fascism. It is fascism!
Shutting down free speech with violence isn't fighting fascism. It IS fascism!
Nitpick: I thought that everybody would wish that, but liberals think society should intervene directly to force that goal, while conservatives think society will be better off as a whole if this is left to the actions of private organizations and individuals. Am I correct?
maybe you should watch less CNN
CNN just reports the news, and indeed, they report being shocked/outraged/horrified by it. Thanks for that, I'm shocked by it too. Think Hindenberg, humanity. To get away from it, you need to watch less Trump, but then, there's a risk with that strategy too.
Did CNN report the fact that Hillary paid for the Trump dossier with the shock and outrage they show with all their anti-Trump propaganda?
You know - the dossier that "proves" Trump colluded with Russia - and was probably spoon-fed to Hillary's operatives by the very Kremlin you're so sure was colluding with Trump?
Why the hell are Democrats so sure Trump colluded with Russia when all the evidence now suggests it was Democrats colluding with Russia?
Hell, like we're now seeing all the Hollywood Democrat supporters being accused of sexual harassment, maybe it's because Democrats are projecting their own behavior...
CNN just reports the news
And if they can't find any news that directly supports their chosen narrative, they simply make some up. If it's so bad they get caught red handed doing it, then they have to publicly fire people for doing it. Which has happened more than once recently, as it was bad enough even by THEIR standards of fake news that they had no choice.
"CNN just reports the news" - that is truly hilarious.
Don't disappoint your bird dog. Go to the range.
The bigger question that should have been clarified long before now is "The president's tweets have zero legal or military weight, right? This should be a silly question but seriously can we get a fucking answer ASAP?"
Obviously, Trump should not issue anything resembling military commands via twitter nor should the military follow anything that looks like a command via twitter.
The first part of that should go without saying, but given that the electoral college elites have successfully put the most incompetent person in the country on the throne, only an idiot would assume it CAN'T happen. It's in the same category as "the president should not fire the guy investigating him for corruption." The framers of the constitution failed to put that in because they wouldn't have been able to fathom a president doing such things.
The second part is something that needs to be clarified. There's currently nothing saying tweets can't be orders. The military shouldn't have to figure out whether something is or is not an order.
It's conceivable with this administration that top military officials would be accused of committing a coup because they didn't act on a tweet.
That is obviously unacceptable already. Yet here we are.
Maybe the possibility that a twitter employee could issue commands to the united states military is enough fucking absurdity to get the GOP cult to act on it? I know they've utterly ruled out the possibility that a foreign adversary like Russia or North Korea could possibly compromise national security by taking advantage of our stupidity via social media. There are a lot of liberals working at twitter, maybe that will get them to think "Hey, this is worth clarifying maybe?"
They're a window into the confusing mind of a very powerful man.
More like, a window into his butt.
Triggered, Ivan?
Wow, the Ivans really don't like the association with Trump's butt. I totally understand, having to spend so much time licking out Vlad's butt and all.
When all you have is a hammer, every problem starts to look like a thumb.