By "social media" we mean any large computer network that allows people to interact in shared communities. The big ones of course are Facebook, Twitter (X), and Instagram, but we can't forget newer platforms like Discord and Slack.
Dedicated video sites are off-topic here and YouTube has its own separate thread
.
What we should discuss in this OTC topic are news items, business operations, and activities by the networks themselves, not specific things posted by users. Those should go into threads appropriate to the subjects of those posts. For example, if an actor tweets about a film, we'd discuss that in the Media forum topic for the film, not here. If Facebook changes its policies, that could be discussed here.
The politics, motives, competency and wider business activities of the owners and leaders of social media companies (e.g. Elon Musk and Mark Zuckerberg) are also off-topic — except in situations where they are directly making specific policy for the platform.
Talking about a particular Instagram policy change (or a high-profile ban on a specific user) directly announced by Mark Zuckerberg would be acceptable in this thread, speculating about Zuckerberg's wider motivations wouldn't be.
The thread's also not about "dumb thing [public figure] said on [social media platform]". If there isn't a specific thread related to the subject of the statement (e.g. US Politics), then it's probably gossip and not worth talking about.
created back in 2020 that we never opened. Unfortunately, it's a little stale, so bumping it isn't going to work very well, but I would like to restart it. The reason I'm doing so is that the Computer Thread seems to have become the de facto place for this sort of talk, and it's a big tonal clash with talking about computer tech.
The hot topic of the day is Elon Musk's bid to acquire Twitter. We first discussed it in the Computer Thread, starting roughly here, and I am not going to rehash the entire discussion. Instead, I am going to resume from the last post:
CNBC: Twitter is reportedly taking another look at Musk takeover bid
Twitter's board is reportedly meeting with Elon Musk and may seek to negotiate on his buyout offer. Musk claims to have secured $46 billion in funding to buy the company at a valuation of $43 billion and is preparing to make a tender offer to its shareholders.
While the board has passed a poison pill, it could be facing resistance to that from groups of shareholders and will want to talk things out rather than face a hostile takeover. It's also possible that Twitter's stock could crash if the offer fails to go through.
Another possible topic was originally posted here.
Ars Technica: EU to unveil landmark law to force Big Tech to police illegal content
Following on from the recently passed Digital Markets Act, which requires large tech companies to unbundle first-party software from hardware platforms, the proposed Digital Services Act will require medium and large social media platforms and search engines to police hate speech and disinformation while adding additional protections for children against targeted marketing.
It also bans "dark patterns", which manipulate or trick people into clicking on ads or other content. The article doesn't explicitly say what that means, but I assume it includes things like disguising ads to look like parts of a site's user interface, hiding "close" buttons, and such.
For large companies, the requirements would go into effect immediately. For medium companies, they would have a grace period to implement the changes.
Thierry Breton, the EU’s internal market commissioner, has warned that Big Tech has become “too big to care.”
This phrase, "too big to care", intrigues me. It's an indictment of the idea that these companies have decided that growth and engagement metrics overwhelm any sense of social responsibility.
In my opinion, a law like this would be impossible in the United States, since it would be challenged (likely successfully) on First Amendment grounds.
Edited by Mrph1 on Dec 12th 2023 at 11:24:56 AM
Team Rocket Boss.
Removing the block feature would be a lot of narcissistic fuel for a LOT of people.
And also be a very bad idea but that's par for the course for Musk.
Like besides people you just don't want to engage with, there's also not being able to escape harassment.
Which def sounds like a goal for Twitter honestly.
Edited by RedHunter543 on Jun 8th 2023 at 2:38:00 AM
I'll teach you a lesson about just how cruel the world can be. That's my job, as an adult.
I'm hearing that Musk is going to replace it with mute which just apparently means that the muted posts won't appear in your timeline instead of complete inability to interact.
All I'm seeing is that this is just going to make harassment and trolling worse. Hopefully, Musk is going to be the biggest victim of his own petard first, so he'll roll this genius idea of his back ASAP.
I'm not as witty as I think I am. It's a scientifically-proven fact.
The Unknown
The mute feature already exists. This whole thing is supremely stupid.
Edited by Karxrida on Jun 8th 2023 at 12:37:15 PM
If a tree falls in the forest and nobody remembers it, who else will you have ice cream with?
Team Rocket Boss.
It feels like an excuse for Musk to be able to interact with people who don’t want to see him.
Like being ignored is one of the worst things that can happen to a narcissist.
And Musk isn’t the only one who benefits from this, all sorts of bullies and assholes will be able to harass people who blocked them.
Like the block function exists for a reason.
I'll teach you a lesson about just how cruel the world can be. That's my job, as an adult.
The Power of Toons and Anime
Supremely stupid is just Twitters new brand under Musk.
Team Rocket Boss.
This is also actively malicious.
Which is also on brand for Twitter.
I'll teach you a lesson about just how cruel the world can be. That's my job, as an adult.
Just a harmless giant from a foreign land.
I'd be willing to bet a cookie that Musk's account would retain the ability to block.
"You can reply to this Message!"
That's assuming that he has the engineers left to actually remove the block button. He'll probably tell them to remove the option from the UI but the under-the-hood ability will still be there, the same way he changed the badge notification to try and hide who bought Blue vs who he gifted it to, but a simple browser plugin revealed that information anyway.
Redmess
He has plenty of engineers left to do so. The process may not be as smooth as it once was, but they can still do everything they want to do.
Optimism is a duty.
Team Rocket Boss.
He's still got cash, so Twitter will go on for a bit more as long as he has that.
I'll teach you a lesson about just how cruel the world can be. That's my job, as an adult.
He also didn't like it when a bunch of people started to parody him either.
Remember, these idiots drive, fuck, and vote. Not always in that order.
Team Rocket Boss.
When an egotistical bully is running Twitter, it's no surprise he enacts policies to support himself and his buddies.
He can dish it out, but he can't take it.
Edited by RedHunter543 on Jun 8th 2023 at 8:05:22 PM
I'll teach you a lesson about just how cruel the world can be. That's my job, as an adult.
That’s not true though, hence the point about failing to fully hide the blue subscriptions. Blue subscribers kept getting blocked over paying for Twitter, so Musk had the engineers make the change to hide the public facing label of who paid vs who got gifted blue, only for the internet to discover in short order that it was just poorly hidden and to have a browser plug-in up in a day to see through it. That doesn’t scream “plenty of engineers”, that screams “can only pull off a rush job.”
Redmess
No, I meant the comment about removing the block button. I wasn't saying they'd do a good job of it, but there are still plenty of engineers around.
Optimism is a duty.
Removing the block function will also stop you from being able to kick people off your Followers list. There are a lot of spam and p0rn accounts that will just start following people to boost their reach, and the only way to get them off your list is to use the block function.
If my post doesn't mention a giant flying sperm whale with oversized teeth and lionfish fins for flippers, it just isn't worth reading.
Apollo, a popular 3rd-party app for accessing Reddit on iOS, will be shutting down at the end of the month because the API fees are ridiculous. It's worth reading through the linked announcement yourself; Reddit's owner and chief admin apparently tried to claim that Apollo's dev tried to blackmail $10M out of Reddit, and said dev actually recorded the call and publicly released it to debunk that.
2 hours after that post, Reddit announced that the chief admin would be doing an AMA about the API stuff.
A society grows great when old men plant trees whose shade they know they will never sit in.
Well that's going to be a absolute disaster.
Pitiable and Illegally Dumped Object
Got the notification to keep my Discord username so I'm good.
Going by quickly too because I signed up in 2016.
Burning love!
The Unknown
![[up]](https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/smiles/arrow_up.png "[up]"){kind=icon}
x4 You can remove followers without blocking them. However, those bots would still be a constant nuisance since you can't stop them from following you again.
Calendar enthusiast
With Reddit about to dive deep into the shit, I decided to take a look at Lemmy. Basically, Lemmy : Reddit :: Mastodon : Twitter. Lemmy and Mastodon both use ActivityPub so it is technically possible to follow a Lemmy account with a Mastodon account; however, Lemmy and Mastodon are very different, and posts from one don't seem to appear in the other's timelines. As such, while they are technically federated, they don't really work together, and if you want to use both, it's easier to just make an account on each.
I made an account on https://lemm.ee because its description says it's laid back, though the most active one seems to be https://lemmy.ml. That's the one where the developers hang out, and so lemmy.ml's relationship to Lemmy seems comparable to that between mastodon.social and Mastodon.
I should really go to bed but I'll post more as I try it out more.
Ukrainian Red Cross
Yeah, a large chunk of Reddit users are very much not happy about these changes. As time goes on, more and more subs are joining the blackout. The AMA had relatively few admin answers and was essentially more of the same, with them trying to defend their current position and not really providing any new information. All of these answers were very heavily downvoted.
I really need to figure out these new alternative social media sites.
The two subs I spend most of my time on are going dark for the protest, and one is considering going dark for even longer than the planned protest.
Personally, I'm especially incensed that I found out about good third party apps because of this, right when they're about to be priced out of existence. The official app mostly works for me, but I haven't liked the change to the Home page, and the entire app has a problem with getting stuck on a random post I viewed briefly and showing it every time I start the app.
A procrastination in of itself
The AMA was so bad that they didn’t announce an end to it, instead a journalist contacted Reddit asking if it had ended and then told the thread when a Reddit spokesperson confirmed that it was over.
“And the Bunny nails it!” ~ Gabrael “If the UN can get through a day without everyone strangling everyone else so can we.” ~ Cyran
Disasturbator
backpeddling in 3,2,1..
New theme music also a box
Elon is again tweeting about his opposition to blocks in Twitter, prompted by the amount of Blue Subscribers complaining about being blocked. He's talked about wanting to remove the block feature before so it might just be all talk, and with the new CEO apparently having already started she might temper his rash decisions but soon you might not be able to block people. Or more likely, you won't be able to block Blue subscribers.