I mean what happens to Twitter’s share price if Musk dumps all his stock and tweets something like “I tried to help Twitter but the company is run by a bunch of bozos. I’m out.” That’s just 76 characters and I bet it would tank Twitter’s stock.
Category: Social Media
70% of Most Active ‘Civic’ Facebook Groups are Terrible Places⇢
I think we’ve all known Facebook is a cesspool, but now we have hard numbers, as Kate Cox writes at Ars Technica:
As Facebook scrambles to deal with its most problematic groups in the wake of January’s assault on the US Capitol, a new report finds that leaders inside the company knew as long ago as August that 70 percent of its top “civic” groups had too much hate speech, misinformation, violent rhetoric, or other toxic behavior to be recommended to other users.
Facebook Blocks Trump’s Accounts Until Inauguration, If Not Longer (Updated: Twitter, Too)⇢
The shocking events of the last 24 hours clearly demonstrate that President Donald Trump intends to use his remaining time in office to undermine the peaceful and lawful transition of power to his elected successor, Joe Biden.
His decision to use his platform to condone rather than condemn the actions of his supporters at the Capitol building has rightly disturbed people in the US and around the world. We removed these statements yesterday because we judged that their effect – and likely their intent – would be to provoke further violence. Following the certification of the election results by Congress, the priority for the whole country must now be to ensure that the remaining 13 days and the days after inauguration pass peacefully and in accordance with established democratic norms.
On Trump’s Internet Censorship Order⇢
Adi Robertson at The Verge, writing about Trump’s executive order concerning how Twitter, Facebook and others should moderate user content:
The order follows a feud with Twitter after it fact-checked one of Trump’s tweets, but it’s been brewing since at least 2019 when a social media “bias” rule was rumored but never revealed. An unfinished draft of the order leaked on Wednesday, full of nonsensical demands and pointless blustering, with many dismissing the rule as simply illegal.
Leaving Facebook Can Make You Happier⇢
Hamza Shaban at The Washington Post, writing about a study that looked at the effects of leaving Facebook:
In the latest study measuring the effects of social media on a person’s life, researchers at New York University and Stanford University found that deactivating Facebook for just four weeks could alter people’s behavior and state of mind. The study found that temporarily quitting Facebook led people to spend more time offline, watching TV and socializing with family and friends; reduced their knowledge of current events and polarization of policy views; and provoked a small but significant improvement in people’s self-reported happiness and satisfaction with their lives.
Twitter is Over
I present two pieces of evidence, just from this week’s news:
- Ashley Feinberg’s interview with Jack Dorsey, in which Twitter’s CEO said they company would “certainly talk about” removing a hypothetical tweet in which Trump called for murder.
- An early look at some of Twitter’s possible future features by Sarah Perez and Ingrid Lunden show that as messy as the current version of Twitter is, the ideas bubbling to the top within the company all look pretty bad.
This is hard for me. I like my little community on Twitter, but I know it is a hellscape of abuse for many. I use it to promote my work and to talk with my audience, but every time I open my replies, I brace myself for something terrible to be there, waiting for me to see it.
Facebook Portal⇢
Jacob Kastrenakes at The Verge:
As Facebook works to contain the fallout from its biggest-ever data breach, the company is introducing a product that will bring a camera and microphone into your living room. Facebook Portal, and the larger Portal Plus, are smart displays that are laser-focused on video chatting.
The first hardware products marketed under the Facebook brand, the Portals can be used to call other Portal users, or anyone who has Facebook or Facebook Messenger. The Portals can play music through Spotify and Pandora, or stream video from Facebook Watch, but these are intentionally limited devices. For better and for worse, you can’t even browse Facebook.
More Americans Taking ‘Facebook Breaks’⇢
Matt Novak, writing at Gizmodo:
Americans have soured on Facebook in the past year, as more people come to terms with the toxic role that the social media platform plays in their lives. A new Pew Research Center survey shows that a large percentage of the population has taken extended breaks from Facebook in the past year, with 26 percent of American users saying that they’ve deleted the app from their phones completely.
Twitter’s API Change Has a Date Again: August 16⇢
Twitter is giving developers more time to adjust to its API platform overhaul, which has affected some apps‘ ability to continue operating in the same fashion. The company clarified this morning, along with news of the general availability of its Account Activity API, that it will be delaying the shutdown of some of its legacy APIs by three months’ time. That is, APIs originally slated for a June 19, 2018 shutdown – including Site Streams, User Streams, and legacy Direct Message Endpoints – will now be deprecated on Wednesday, August 16, 2018.
SmugMug Buying Flickr⇢
Flickr has been snapped up by Silicon Valley photo-sharing and storage company SmugMug, USA TODAY has learned.
SmugMug CEO Don MacAskill told USA TODAY he’s committed to breathing new life into the faded social networking pioneer, which hosted photos and lively interactions long before it became trendy.
SmugMug, an independent, family-run company, will maintain Flickr as a standalone community of amateur and professional photographers and give the long neglected service the focus and resources it deserves, MacAskill said in an exclusive interview.
Zuckerberg’s 14-Year Apology Tour⇢
Zeynep Tufekci, writing at Wired:
Zuckerberg’s outright denial that Facebook’s business interests play a powerful role in shaping its behavior doesn’t bode well for Facebook’s chances of doing better in the future. I don’t doubt that the company has, on occasion, held itself back from bad behavior. That doesn’t make Facebook that exceptional, nor does it excuse its existing choices, nor does it alter the fact that its business model is fundamentally driving its actions.
Twitter Breaking Third-Party Clients in June (Updated)⇢
On June 19, Twitter has said it will be disabling “streaming services,” which is how third-party apps like Tweetbot and Twitterrific can stream the timeline and send push notifications. The replacement, the Account Activity API is not available to third-party developers:
The new Account Activity API is currently in beta testing, but third-party developers have not been given access and time is running out.
With access we might be able to implement some push notifications, but they would be limited at the standard level to 35 Twitter accounts – our products must deliver notifications to hundreds of thousands of customers. No pricing has been given for Enterprise level service with unlimited accounts – we have no idea if this will be an affordable option for us and our users.