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Twitter Has Been Secretly Verifying Thousands of Accounts, Even Though It Insists Its Verification Program is on Hold (mashable.com)
Twitter has verified more than 10,000 accounts in recent months, despite putting its verification program on hold. From a report: The company has said little publicly about verification, which it suspended in 2017 following backlash over its verification of a white supremacist. But data viewed by Mashable suggests the company is verifying a flurry of accounts each month despite the supposed break. Celebrities, and others with backchannel connections to the company, are able to become verified as Twitter ignores everyday users and those without insider access. In many ways, this secretive process is now more opaque and unfair than it was when anyone could apply on Twitter's website. At a time when Twitter says it's trying to be more transparent about its rules, the lack of an official verification policy is hurting groups already susceptible to abuse, critics say. Further reading: 'Verified' Is Now a Derogatory Term on Twitter.
As an avid twitter user, I encounter a lot of hate speech on twitter. When I report people, it seems those that are verified get away with it while those with no blue tick are temporarily or permanently suspended, even for the exact same behaviour. Twitter isn't thoroughly awful, though some thoroughly awful people get verified blue ticks and continue to pollute the internet .
https://youtu.be/DZCBRHOg3PQ Tim Pool destroyed Twitter's credibility. Twitter seems to have doubled down instead of reforming. It was brilliant watching someone with journalistic ethics who did his homework do his thing.
"Twitter should explain how exactly they do verification so we can find ways to exploit/abuse it (& make it useless)!!!"
I think Twitter is just another form of whatever the Jerry Springer Show was (is?) in that it's a dumpster fire that draws people in like moths to its dumpster fire flame. Only Twitter lets you be act like part of the live studio audience and join in dumpster fire from anywhere on the planet.
You're asking people to step away from that and expecting that they'll be able to do so?
Twitter gave everyone a voice. Unfortunately that voice is cancer. We would all be better off if twitter just disappeared.
Only the State obtains its revenue by coercion. - Murray Rothbard
As a New Zealander I looked for what I could best do in response the murders of my fellow citizens. The message from the survivors is "this started with hate speech. Call it out when you see it, stop it spreading, we should all be bettr than this, don't be complicit."
A utility would just pass comments between people.
A publisher now wants control over who can say what. Control over the politics of every account.
Social media becomes the owner and publisher of its users comments.
But still expects the full protections of only been a utility with every user still fully responsible for their comments.
Only some people may publish and be approved to publish.
Domestic spying is now "Benign Information Gathering"
They censor people when it's perceived to harm their business. They made a determination that having swastikas on their platform is worse for business than having Taylor Swift - makes sense to me. When a government censors, that's usually going to be some kind of ideological thought control. Twitter's concern extends only to their brand image.
Of course, they still end up with egg on their face from the verification fiasco. Half-hearted disavowals of racism and stark displays of nepotism - they seem to be taking a page from our head of state. Funnily enough, he also gets special treatment in bending Twitter's rules. So much for left-wing bias. He's just another A-list celeb they need to have to keep their brand relevant.
None of this surprises me or even really bothers me. They could ban everyone tomorrow and I wouldn't blink. They'd all move to some new, probably better alternative. There must be a teeming, untapped market for "freedom"-focused social media, right?