Tricky Twitter Hiding Hashtags

[Schadrach]

Twitter is trying to make it harder to say certain things n Twitter, by "soft censoring" the site.

Recently, a certain controversial writer for Breitbart UK had his "verified" tag removed from his Twitter account (which is bizarre, given it is his account and the mark allegedly exists solely to make it harder for people to impersonate public persons).

His fans started a protest hashtag, #JeSuisMilo, which was one of the top trending hashtags for much of the weekend, at which point it mysteriously vanished from the trending list. More interestingly, it also no longer shows up on the autocomplete.

#tcot is doing the same thing (that one targets conservatives on the platform, and is meant to be short for "top conservatives on twitter").

Similarly, #GamerGate no longer appears on autocomplete.
Same for #notyourshield.
Some anti-Merkel German hashtags also seem to be effected.

What gets more interesting is that autocomplete shows typos for many of those, like #JeSuisMila, #JeSuisMilou, #notyoursheild, and the like.

Is Twitter trying to defang hashtags they don't like by getting lazy people to post on the wrong hastag? Divide and conquer, anyone?



Anyone know any other hashtags that seem to be effects?

 

[Zontar]

Twitter's bias are as widely known as they are open. Though funny enough their actions have made him more popular [http://www.breitbart.com/tech/2016/01/10/de-verification-leads-to-20000-new-followers-for-milo-yiannopoulos/] and given him more exposure [http://money.cnn.com/2016/01/10/technology/twitter-hate-speech-crackdown-milo-yiannopoulos/index.html] then ever before.

Plus that general attitude of theirs as a company of acting like this towards things they disagree with (and through their actions giving the implications that Islamic terrorism is acceptable in their view given their tolerance of ISIS propaganda) is costing them money [http://www.breitbart.com/tech/2016/01/10/at-war-with-conservatives-stock-price-tanking-users-alienated-is-this-the-end-for-twitter/].

All I can say is let the site burn. It's a terrible social media site that used to fill a niche that is now long in need of a new site to replace it for.

 

[DefunctTheory]

It is a bit bizarre.

It's strange for a company like twitter to take a proactive steps like this. Guess I'm lucky I only use twitter to get messages from HBS and amuse myself with Lonely Luke and George Takei.

 

[Schadrach]

Twitter has tags can't melt steel beams.

You make it sound like being a truther, and not like something directly observable from across the internet right now.

Don't they know that they're just feeding gamergates already massive victim complex?

Not just GG hashtags were effected. Several German anti-Merkel hastags were also effected, at the least. No clue what else, if anything might be effected.

 

[KyuubiNoKitsune-Hime]

I have a hard time being upset about this because of the toxicity that comes out of those hashtags, but I'll wear my bias openly here. The only reason I hear about this is because a not insignificant amount of transphobia seeps out with these hashtags, which friends foreword to me constantly.

Then again I see that twitter is capitulating all over the place, like they're upping the character limit to 10,000 characters in the near future. I've always been ambivalent to twitter, I don't use it, and since it's become such a toxic sewer in recent years, I'm glad I never got into it. Really the nastiness comes equally from both sides of any debate "liberal" or "conservative" on twitter and I'm just kind of tired of it all. Hopefully twitter does start to see a massive decline, so that the horrible harassment perpetrated on all sides will fade, because it's been disturbing that it happens on a major social media site. That it's been allowed to happen on a major social media site for that matter too.

Targeting conservatives though, but excluding liberals, if true, twitter has some explaining to do.

 

[Queen Michael]

I have a hard time being upset about this because of the toxicity that comes out of those hashtags, but I'll wear my bias openly here. The only reason I hear about this is because a not insignificant amount of transphobia seeps out with these hashtags, which friends foreword to me constantly.

Why would your friends send you transphobia if you're trans?

 

[KyuubiNoKitsune-Hime]

I have a hard time being upset about this because of the toxicity that comes out of those hashtags, but I'll wear my bias openly here. The only reason I hear about this is because a not insignificant amount of transphobia seeps out with these hashtags, which friends foreword to me constantly.

Why would your friends send you transphobia if you're trans?

Mostly it's trans friends, the idea of spreading awareness about current trends in transphobia, something it's smart to pay attention to when you're trans. For the sake of one's own safety at the very minimum.

 

[Jux]

From what I understand, they unverified him as a slap on the wrist for some things he's said on twitter. What I can't understand is why they didn't ban that hateful shithead outright.

I find it deliciously ironic though that the response has been what it is though. A bunch of people that claim to be against outrage culture petition the freaking white house over this, and compare their solidarity with said jerk to the solidarity expressed over the literal murder of cartoonists by extremists. I don't know how they could have topped themselves here, I really don't.

Good on twitter for stepping up here, if that's the case.

 

[Something Amyss]

That does sound pretty messed up. I think I understand they may have stumbled across it, felt angry, and decided "I want this person to be angry about it too", but still that's not taking your feelings into consideration.

Because they're trying to be helpful. They know the related issue is important to us. And the thing is, sometimes, people (even well-intentioined ones) seem to forget we're more than a gender identity (or insert other minority as you see fit). It's often doe out of support or solidarity, not outrage.

 

[Andy Shandy]

For what it's worth neither #AntiGG nor #AntiGamerGate are in the autofill, and none of the typo hashtags were in either. Then again, I do use Tweetdeck, so that might make a difference?

I'd have two guesses as to why they've disappeared. The first is a hashtag's fading relevance. To use an example, #BallondOr was trending due to yesterday's Ballon d'Or event (it's a football awards thing, for those that don't know). However, it'll drop off fairly quickly, and - while still perhaps used occasionally - won't be relevant until next year.

My second guess - and the one I think is much more likely - is the perceived increase in toxicity and extremism. Whether valid or not, I imagine people using and tweets using these hashtags are reported more often than in the average hashtag, which after crossing a certain threshold would then lead to said hashtags being pulled from the autofill, no matter how popular they are.

I should say that I have no association with Twitter besides using the service, so this is entirely guesswork. So I could - and probably am - completely wrong.

 

[DudeistBelieve]

My only reaction to this is that they'll take pro-active steps against fucking GamerGate, but meanwhile MOTHERFUCKING ISIS is still allowed to have a presence on Twitter?

In what fucking universe does that make sense?

Well whatever. It's their website they can do whatever the fuck they want. Don't like their policies? Leave.

 

[Secondhand Revenant]

Honestly I'm pretty amused. Good on Twitter. I don't really demand that they be impartial. And I enjoy the less than impartial stance they may have take if the way this is being represented isn't pure spin. Which I think is distinctly possible.

 

[Schadrach]

For what it's worth neither #AntiGG nor #AntiGamerGate are in the autofill, and none of the typo hashtags were in either. Then again, I do use Tweetdeck, so that might make a difference?

Interestingly, Tweetdeck and the main site seem to pull different autocomplete, and they've started hiding more tags (and they aren't all on one political line, now). Could be part of a larger plan to reduce certain kinds of controversial speech in general, rather than being politically targeted, and they just happened to start with the JeSuisMilo and GG related tags.

If we're really lucky, maybe they'll start being more impartial about how they apply other rules (it amazes me that folks can get away with doxxing, retweeting doxxing, saying things that would otherwise be considered harassment and the like so long as their on the "right" side).