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Twitter Says It Will Let All Users Hide Replies To Tweets (bloomberg.com) 49

Twitter said it will start letting all users hide replies to the tweets they send, an effort to improve the health of discussions and interactions on the service. From a report: The company has been testing the feature since summer in different markets, including the U.S. and Japan, but is now rolling it out globally. The tool lets users hide specific comments made on their posts, meaning those comments won't be visible to other users unless they click a button to reveal them. The change provides a degree of control that could be used to keep spammers away, or to hide hateful or inappropriate replies.
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Twitter Says It Will Let All Users Hide Replies To Tweets

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  • Twitter users should be officially referred to as "twats." Twitter twats. Sounds a bit like Tater Tots, which everyone loves. That would be some fine marketing, I think.
  • by Jarwulf ( 530523 ) on Thursday November 21, 2019 @04:29PM (#59440448)
    Well I guess this was inevitable since your typical bluecheckmark/influencer has no interest in discussion and just wants to give one way lectures.
    • Exactly. And the Blue Check is now used as a Twitter endorsement. Being an editorial publisher is actually easier when you don't have to actually write your own opinion, but just promote and amplify a myriad of free content that echo your own opinions.
    • So does it now become labeled as Dissocial Media as a platform?
    • by AHuxley ( 892839 )
      Self censorship.
      The good censor approves.
    • by trawg ( 308495 )

      Well I guess this was inevitable since your typical bluecheckmark/influencer has no interest in discussion and just wants to give one way lectures.

      I think there are definitely many bluechecks that fit this category - they see it as a pulpit from which they can deliver one-way sermons and basically ignore the feedback.

      But I think part of the problem is the sheer volume of replies they receive are, from a practical level, totally unmanageable. I barely use Twitter at all and on several of the very rare occasions where I reply into a thread, I have gotten a stack of replies, some interesting, some not.

      I cannot imagine being a major Twitter presence and

  • So Trump will be able to 'hide' the nasty-sayers who mock him but not 'block' them?
    Will that prevent the next heart attack?

    • Most likely not. The courts ruled he can't block anyone, so one may guess this would be seen similar. I can't imagine he goes through his replies anyways. He's a one-way user who isn't interested in what others have to say.
      • If Trump is a "one-way user who isn't interested in what others have to say," then why did he block those people who sued him? It's because he does read comments and cares... to some extent.

      • The courts ruled he can't block anyone

        I have no idea why you think he is all that concerned about this.

    • by Moryath ( 553296 )
      No, it'll just make it even more of a weird echo chamber. If they wanted to "improve the health of discussions and interactions", the first step would be to ban the abusive neo-nazis who cause the problems in the first place.

      The problem with that is that they'd actually have to enforce their policies, as written, on accounts like a certain faketan-and-bleach-blonded delinquent male.
      • Re:I see (Score:5, Informative)

        by Curunir_wolf ( 588405 ) on Thursday November 21, 2019 @05:46PM (#59440706) Homepage Journal

        The neo-nazis have already been banned. The only abusive Twitter users left are the radical leftists and Marxists.

    • Comment removed based on user account deletion
    • by p0p0 ( 1841106 )
      TRUMP TRUMP TRUMP TRUMP TRUMP!
      People say Trump is a bad businessman but they let him live in their head rent-free. What a deal!
  • Uh huh. (Score:4, Insightful)

    by Chris Mattern ( 191822 ) on Thursday November 21, 2019 @04:44PM (#59440484)

    The change provides a degree of control that could be used to keep spammers away, or to hide hateful or inappropriate replies.

    Or it could be used to squelch everybody who disagrees with you. Gee, I wonder what use we'll see the most of...

    • Re:Uh huh. (Score:5, Insightful)

      by ScienceofSpock ( 637158 ) <.keith.greene. .at. .gmail.com.> on Thursday November 21, 2019 @05:04PM (#59440548) Homepage

      EXACTLY this. Sure it was created to allow the user to control *inappropriate* or *hateful* comments, but I guarantee the vast majority will be used to hide corrections and disagreements, and that will just allow more disinformation to get out there.

      Someone has countered your flat-earth argument with actual facts and data? Hide their reply! Don't like people explaining why not vaccinating your kids is bad? Hide their reply!

      Just kidding, I'm sure this won't be abused in any way whatsoever.

      • How about you do whatever you did before the internet, like stand outside their house and yell at them, or mail them tons of annoying letters. Or not, Christ.

        Maybe you don't really NEED a way to get in someone's face every time they're wrong. We have town halls where you can do that, for important things, like hiring a dog catcher, building speed bumps, or where to move that annoying flashing sign that goes off when someone drives five over the limit.

        You can speak your counterpoints just fine without bein

        • like stand outside their house and yell at them, or mail them tons of annoying letters.

          Were you not around before the Internet? We stood outside their houses and egged them, and mailed them letters with anthrax powder. In the winter, you could even get an anthrax-coated frozen egg to smash through someone's bedroom window.

      • To be fair, I've seen all sorts of very nasty Twitter comments from every side you can imagine, and the only solution I found to the problem was to stay well away from Twitter.
    • Omg can you imagine how different the internet today would be BBS, Usenet, AOL, CompuServe, IRC, etc. had all been moderated, think of all the terrible squelching of opinions that would have taken place.

    • Yep. It'll be used by Liberals to hide Conservative responses, and by Conservatives to hide any well-reasoned Liberal response so everyone sees nutjob left-wing responses that don't hold up to scrutiny.

      Maybe all the right-wingers will stop blocking me when they lose arguments now.

  • and other politicians! :)

  • by MrLint ( 519792 ) on Thursday November 21, 2019 @04:58PM (#59440528) Journal

    A social media platform without any interaction.. sounds... nice?

  • This will be interesting to see.

    People that make idiotic comments on Twitter tend to get "ratio'd" (They have far more comments than likes, comments that show the idiocy of the comment and/or excoriate the commentor). So I guess now these folks can just hide the fact that most of Twitter views them as an idiot.

    It will help the blue-checked users a lot. (Getting a blue check on Twitter is no longer a verification of your identity: It's now an endorsement by Twitter of you and your views).

  • by tinkerton ( 199273 ) on Thursday November 21, 2019 @05:45PM (#59440702)

    that is what is driving these actions. "We" are losing control over the narrative. Trump was elected because we lost control. We need to regain control. Therefore the alternative narratives are bad. They are "Putin" or "fringe" or "conspiracy" and it is just to suppress them.

  • Apparently the problem is low-quality dialog. Twitter is trying to remedy that problem by allowing us to shut down dialog we don't like. But shutting down dialog comes with its own problems: ideological echo chambers; divided society where people can't meaningfully connect with or understand people who think differently. The challenge is, how to get better at engaging in high-quality dialog with those with whom we disagree.
    • Easy, stay off of Twitter. It's not designed to facilitate dialogue.
    • Many comments mechanisms to mainstream articles are being closed down partially or completely with the argument that they are low quality. This is a partial truth. The other part is it is eliminating a form of public feedback to what you are publishing.
      It is a consequence of the realization that you're losing control of the narrative.

  • The liberal leftist way of doing things.
  • "The change provides a degree of control that could be used to keep spammers away, or to hide hateful or inappropriate replies" [or to censor all opposing opinions.]

In the long run, every program becomes rococco, and then rubble. -- Alan Perlis

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