10 Major Reasons Why Twitter Is The Best Social Media Platform

I’ve criticised Twitter extensively on this blog, and I’m not about to retract any of my whining episodes. But I wouldn’t be complaining if I didn’t care, and the reason I care is that Twitter is not only the best social media platform; for many people it’s the only social media platform. I’m using this post to document why. Please be aware that the following points apply at the time of writing, but that policies can change…

TWITTER LETS USERS POST IN ANONYMITY

Oppressive social sites insist that users publish under their real names, because it increases the value of people’s personal data. The platforms claim they make the real-names-only insistence for safety reasons, but there’s nothing safe about forcing everyone to identify themselves in an unvetted public place. How safe would it be if everyone who walked into a night club was forced to wear a T-shirt with their legal name on it? Clearly, it would be a stalker’s, burglar’s, mugger’s, blackmailer’s and rapist’s charter. That’s the reality of real-name-only policies.

Real-name-only policies also inhibit humour, and other fundamental bases for online entertainment. Broadly, they stifle fun and promote an environment that’s little different from being at work.

Twitter has benefitted enormously from its freedom of identity. Not only does it have a fun and progressive vibe – it’s also become a home to major communities who, precisely because of their dependency on anonymity, cannot legitimately exist on Facebook or other oppressive sites. Yes, anonymity assists cowardly trolls to an extent, but the vibrancy and life it encourages almost infinitely outweighs the negatives.

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Flagbot: The Censorship Protocol That Will Change YOUR Behaviour

Once upon a time, we all used to post on old-style, moderated forums. Forums were far from perfect, but one thing we could be sure of was that if we observed the forum rules, our accounts and profiles were safe. On most forums, moderators would even privately warn members if they were sailing close to a penalty of some kind. How different things are now that massive social media and publishing sites have become the hub of our online activity.

ENTER THE FLAGBOT…

Almost all large, user-generated content platforms now use ‘flagbots’ to moderate their sites. A flagbot is simply a piece of software designed to detect breaches of the Terms of Service, so a human moderator doesn’t have to do it. Great! It’s labour-saving, and that means the sites can spend their money on more important stuff, like… Well, spying on us and selling their findings to corporate thugs, obviously.

There are just one or two snags. The flagbots are engineered not only to detect ToS breaches, but also to actually take immediate, shoot-on-sight, punitive action. So if they get it wrong (and Snag 2 – flagbots have no sense, so they do get it wrong, a lot), masses of innocent users are punished for good behaviour.

What Oath Should Do With Tumblr After The Porn Ban

Agghhh, Tumblr. A technically beautiful site which has influenced the biggest and best blogging platforms, and is still packed with little-known publishing tricks and delights. But management of the blue-walled behemoth has been so frustrating through the past five years. Tumblr has to make money, and it can, but if it is to survive, the proprietor must stop kicking its enticers in the teeth, and put them at the centre of the revenue-earning policy.

I’m going to explain how that could be done in this post, but first, let’s assess where things currently are…

The Truth About “Link Tax” and “Censorship Machines”

We’re here again. The censorship card is at the top of the deck, as the internet’s freedom to steal content faces one of its stiffest challenges yet. Just from the collection of manipulative voices spouting highly-charged phrases like “link tax” and “censorship machines”, we know there’s a copyright-related bill in motion. That bill, is the revised European Union Copyright Directive, and the reaction it’s whipped up is almost surreal in its level of distortion.

Whilst I’m discussing the new Directive in this post, I really want to send out a general counter-protest against the cyber giants’ relentless playing of a censorship card, every time the internet’s freedom to steal comes under threat. It happened with SOPA, it happened with Net Neutrality. And it’ll keep happening as long as we’re stupid enough to accept that policing Silicon Valley’s behaviour somehow equates to censorship.

Will SmugMug Keep Flickr Free To Use?

It’s a testament to Yahoo!/Oath’s running of Flickr in recent times, that it took an official email notification of SmugMug’s new acquisition to remind me that Flickr still existed. For reasons I outlined in the recent Oath/Tumblr post, businesses such as Oath do not inspire great confidence in creative people. But unlike Oath, SmugMug is not a portal-wielding bait-baron obsessed with trite, populist news and cheesily-executed ad campaigns. It’s a photo-sharing business. So, has Flickr been saved?

Twitter Users Enraged By Force-Fed Notifications

A storm of angry tweets has flooded Twitter after the social media giant began force-feeding irrelevant activities onto users’ Notifications timelines. But this is just the latest in a series of force-feeding tactics which have shown Twitter to be taking a dictatorial approach to the user experience.

The Not-So-Advanced World of Online Troll Investigation

“As a result of other posts on this blog, I’ve got used to being asked for help in unmasking “trolls”. Most typically, the requests have come from political activists who think they have the right to verbally attack those with whom they don’t agree, but should themselves be immune from any such attacks. Because… well, you know… Because their opinion is right, and everyone else’s is wrong, basically.