# Twitter is a poor place



## JarooAshstaff (May 11, 2022)

Some people have real followings, like Matt Mercer with 600k followers, but even then he only gets 1500 likes when he announces the next episode of CR is starting.
But he will get 20k likes if he tells everyone to look after themselves.

When it comes to people who run the best podcasts in DnD examining the game or modules or products.  Man its so hard for them, usually like 2k - 6k followers only after 5 years of podcasting.  Maybe they get 20 or 30 likes on posts.

Where my eyes to start to tear up is when people like Ed Greenwood, the grandfather of 2nd edition novels, uses it to write content for the FR every single day.  As much as I loved the realms, I cannot take this format Ed uses of 1) 2) 3).... 30) to post long stories using short tweets.  And he writes 50 tweets per day.  Its incredibly frustrating to have on your feed, so inevitably I, as with his other 24k followers, have to mute him. 

I really blame the poor usability  and design of Twitter for not evolving.  I had high hopes Elon would recognize all the issues and fix them.  But once he said he would reinstate someones account who tried to end democracy and have his VP murdered, well I think I realize now.

Its time to turn Twitter off.


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## Morrus (May 11, 2022)

I mean, I think that's just the internet. And the world. Twitter is one example, but it's the same everywhere. The most popular stuff in the world is the Kardashians, the Daily Mail, etc., not scientists or aid workers in war torn countries.


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## AnotherGuy (May 11, 2022)

JarooAshstaff said:


> But once he said he would reinstate someones account who tried to end democracy and have his VP murdered, well I think I realize now.



How important to you was it to politicise your post?


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## trappedslider (May 11, 2022)




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## payn (May 11, 2022)

It's true, twitter is best for announcements and not a great place to drop large amounts of content or have a meaningful conversation. I dont see how any owner could fix that.


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## Morrus (May 11, 2022)

JarooAshstaff said:


> But once he said he would reinstate someones account who tried to end democracy and have his VP murdered, well I think I realize now.





AnotherGuy said:


> How important to you was it to politicise your post?



Oooh, yeah, I didn't notice that. Let's not do that here please folks!


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## Morrus (May 11, 2022)

It's also important to remember that Twitter is just one place. I know it's easy to find yourself in a bubble and think that's the whole world, but Twitter is not the TTRPG community any more than, say, here is. There's always a whole range of ways to interact with the community, and they all tend to be fairly isolated from each other.


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## Umbran (May 11, 2022)

JarooAshstaff said:


> I really blame the poor usability  and design of Twitter for not evolving.




With respect, that's like claiming that hammers should evolve because they aren't shovels.  The tool has features to make it good at what it is designed to do. That people try to use it for other things is not the tool's fault.  



JarooAshstaff said:


> I had high hopes Elon would recognize all the issues and fix them.




Yeah, sorry.  Musk is not an expert in software, UX design, network dynamics, or social dynamics.  His only hope is to hire people who know better than he does, and listen to them.


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## trappedslider (May 11, 2022)

payn said:


> It's true, twitter is best for announcements and not a great place to drop large amounts of content or have a meaningful conversation. I dont see how any owner could fix that.



I dunno about that, I've had a few meaningful conversations on it with a couple of my favorite authors.


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## Ryujin (May 11, 2022)

JarooAshstaff said:


> Some people have real followings, like Matt Mercer with 600k followers, but even then he only gets 1500 likes when he announces the next episode of CR is starting.
> But he will get 20k likes if he tells everyone to look after themselves.
> 
> When it comes to people who run the best podcasts in DnD examining the game or modules or products.  Man its so hard for them, usually like 2k - 6k followers only after 5 years of podcasting.  Maybe they get 20 or 30 likes on posts.
> ...



What you are describing is someone who is using the medium for a purpose other than that intended. Twitter is for short comments, not long form discussion or prose. Sure, I can use the handle of a screwdriver as a hammer, but wouldn't it be better to just use a hammer?


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## payn (May 11, 2022)

trappedslider said:


> I dunno about that, I've had a few meaningful conversations on it with a couple of my favorite authors.



Not a "great place" doesnt mean impossible.


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## nyvinter (May 11, 2022)

JarooAshstaff said:


> Some people have real followings, like Matt Mercer with 600k followers, but even then he only gets 1500 likes when he announces the next episode of CR is starting.
> But he will get 20k likes if he tells everyone to look after themselves.




As a creative person, you need to learn not to take any stock in social media engagements. Because if you start to do that, then it will worm its way into your self-worth you'll get caught in a anxiety/depression spiral. This is not true just of Twitter, but tumblr, instagarm, facebook, whathave you. All the social media.

And also, like all asynchronous social media — which is all but Facebook now — unless you're famous your experience will mostly be shaped by who you follow and less by who follows you. 

But yeah, going hard against limitations and ignoring them will lead to issues. But if a friend decides to play a 3D movie on my non-3D tv, I can't really blame the tv for it not working as intended.


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## doctorbadwolf (May 11, 2022)

Umbran said:


> Yeah, sorry.  Musk is not an expert in software, UX design, network dynamics, or social dynamics.  His only hope is to hire people who know better than he does, and listen to them.



His only actual areas of expertise are getting big mad on social media at people who criticize him in any way, and investing inherited wealth.


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## Ryujin (May 11, 2022)

nyvinter said:


> As a creative person, you need to learn not to take any stock in social media engagements. Because if you start to do that, then it will worm its way into your self-worth you'll get caught in a anxiety/depression spiral. This is not true just of Twitter, but tumblr, instagarm, facebook, whathave you. All the social media.
> 
> And also, like all asynchronous social media — which is all but Facebook now — unless you're famous your experience will mostly be shaped by who you follow and less by who follows you.
> 
> But yeah, going hard against limitations and ignoring them will lead to issues. But if a friend decides to play a 3D movie on my non-3D tv, I can't really blame the tv for it not working as intended.



Advice from content creators: Do *NOT* read the comment section on youtube.


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## TheAlkaizer (May 11, 2022)

doctorbadwolf said:


> His only actual areas of expertise are getting big mad on social media at people who criticize him in any way, and investing inherited wealth.



He's not my favorite person, but it's disingenous to say he's only good at social medias. Much of his success has been from smart business moves, notably shifting technology and knowledge between different product lines to jump ahead technology or fix inherent problems. Putting the rockets technologies in the electric car, and the electric car technology in the rockets. He's a great example of what a CEO does. He finds business opportunities, knows where to get the right people or technologies and get them at fixing these problems. There's the added benefit that he's an engineer himself, so he understands at least the high-level track of the projects he launches.


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## delericho (May 11, 2022)

I tend to consider Twitter to be the internet's sewer - sometimes you can find things of value in there, but is it _really_ worth wading through all the... rest?


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## Morrus (May 11, 2022)

delericho said:


> I tend to consider Twitter to be the internet's sewer - sometimes you can find things of value in there, but is it _really_ worth wading through all the... rest?



Funnily that’s what they say about us!


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## doctorbadwolf (May 11, 2022)

TheAlkaizer said:


> He's not my favorite person, but it's disingenous to say he's only good at social medias.



Since I didn’t say that, this seems an odd reply. 


TheAlkaizer said:


> Much of his success has been from smart business moves, notably shifting technology and knowledge between different product lines to jump ahead technology or fix inherent problems. Putting the rockets technologies in the electric car, and the electric car technology in the rockets. He's a great example of what a CEO does. He finds business opportunities, knows where to get the right people or technologies and get them at fixing these problems. There's the added benefit that he's an engineer himself, so he understands at least the high-level track of the projects he launches.



So, investing his inherited apartheid wealth. Like I said.


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## doctorbadwolf (May 11, 2022)

delericho said:


> I tend to consider Twitter to be the internet's sewer - sometimes you can find things of value in there, but is it _really_ worth wading through all the... rest?



Twitter is a completely different place for different people. If you just passively consume without any curation, you get garbage, but that’s just as true of Reddit and more true of Facebook. If you do curate your feed, you have a fun and informative place that is about to get a lot worse due to being the sole property of America’s second-most hypersensitive and vindictive oligarch.


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## Umbran (May 11, 2022)

TheAlkaizer said:


> He's not my favorite person, but it's disingenous to say he's only good at social medias.




Well, given that the statement that he was good at social media _AND_ investing, we are okay then.  It isn't great when you leave off half of what someone says, and call them disingenuous for the lack.



TheAlkaizer said:


> There's the added benefit that he's an engineer himself...




He is _self-styled_ as an engineer.  He has a Bachelor of Arts in Physics, and a Bachelor of Science in Economics.  He was accepted into a PhD program in material sciences at Stanford, but dropped out after two days.  Lacking formal education, and not having held a job in which engineering was his primary responsibility, his claim on the title is open to question.


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## TheAlkaizer (May 11, 2022)

Umbran said:


> Well, given that the statement that he was good at social media _AND_ investing, we are okay then. It isn't great when you leave off half of what someone says, and call them disingenuous for the lack.



Given that what I covered is neither social medias nor just straight investing, I don't see the problem. I didn't leave half of it. He didn't just pump his inherited wealth like most wealth investors do. As I said, what he does and does well is much more strategic in nature.


doctorbadwolf said:


> His *only actual areas of expertise* are getting big mad on social media at people who criticize him in any way, and investing inherited wealth.





doctorbadwolf said:


> Since I didn’t say that, this seems an odd reply.



My reply is a proposition that he's also an expert at lateral thinking, moving and managing assets and technologies between different business domains to get and advantage. So I'm saying that what you listed are not _his only actual areas of expertise_. I don't see how it's disconnected.


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## Gradine (May 11, 2022)

Twitter, like most forms of online communication, is a perfectly fine and occasionally fantastic medium that is crowded with bad faith actors using the medium to stoke hatred and bigotry and spread misinformation; as well as a slew of good faith actors who have been manipulated into insisting on absolutely purity of ethics, morality, and politics.


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## Jer (May 11, 2022)

Twitter is, from a design and communication perspective, really awful. It's a firehose of thoughts from individuals you're following all interleaved together with no rhyme or reason and no way to impose any order onto them (at least not built in to Twitter directly - you used to be able to find 3rd party apps that would at least try to give you a decent user experience, I don't know if they still exist).  The algorithm that they organize tweets with is not just opaque, it seems to be designed to be nonsense and to also raise people's blood pressure.  

The only reason to be on Twitter as a platform is for the people who are using it.  The actual tech and user interface of Twitter is a trashfire.  The only thing that made it even remotely usable to me was by being very loose with the block button and just blocking anyone who was a jerk in public on it, and even then actually finding anything on the app/site is aggravating - the only thing it's good for is "empty calorie one-way 'discussion'" - it doesn't do depth on a topic well, it's not great about breadth, and honestly even the comedy on the site is mostly some variation of the same joke over and over again (i.e. pointing at something happening in the world and saying some variation on "can you believe this nonsense?"). And eventually I realized that I got absolutely nothing off of Twitter but aggravation.  I'm now Twitter free for over a year and I can honestly say my life is much better off now than it was before I logged off.


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## doctorbadwolf (May 11, 2022)

TheAlkaizer said:


> Given that what I covered is neither social medias nor just straight investing, I don't see the problem. I didn't leave half of it. He didn't just pump his inherited wealth like most wealth investors do. As I said, what he does and does well is much more strategic in nature.



If that was your intent, you communicated it _very_ poorly. 

You literally said 


TheAlkaizer said:


> He's not my favorite person, but it's disingenous to say he's only good at social medias.



This statement does not say what you seem to think it says. 

It's also really bad form to accuse me of disingenuousness just because you disagree with my assessment.


TheAlkaizer said:


> My reply is a proposition that he's also an expert at lateral thinking, moving and managing assets and technologies between different business domains to get and advantage.



And there is very little evidence supporting this idea. He bought his way into being called a "founder" of a company he didn't have any part in founding, and wasn't even one of the initial investors in, and then bought out the actual founders so he could position himself as "the guy who started Tesla Motors". He then hired some _actual_ engineers (I've met a few, btw, and a couple fabricators of various skillsets. He's a terrible boss.) to make a rocket company, and then let his various engineers talk shop with eachother and share ideas. 

Paypal is the closest he's ever come to actually coming up with anything especially interesting. 




TheAlkaizer said:


> So I'm saying that what you listed are not _his only actual areas of expertise_. I don't see how it's disconnected.



What you _said_ is that I was being dishonest (that's really what the word means) by saying a thing that I objectively did not say.

And I'm not as polite as Umbran, so I'll just come out and say it. He is not an engineer. He's a rich guy that likes tech.


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## doctorbadwolf (May 11, 2022)

Gradine said:


> Twitter, like most forms of online communication, is a perfectly fine and occasionally fantastic medium that is crowded with bad faith actors using the medium to stoke hatred and bigotry and spread misinformation; as well as a slew of good faith actors who have been manipulated into insisting on absolutely purity of ethics, morality, and politics.



It's just gonna get worse, unfortunately. 

Twitter lacked the guts to kick out the nazis before, now it's owned by a guy who buys into the "sunlight as disinfectant" nonsense, and who will kick his critics off the platform while reinstating the account of a seditious former POTUS who primarily uses the platform to harass people and encourage violence. 

I used to have some small hope for twitter. We'd be better off with Bezos owning it, and I speak as someone who views Bezos as someone whose influence on our nation is almost exclusively negative.


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## Bedrockgames (May 11, 2022)

Social media is reach, so there is a trade off, but I basically pulled off twitter, scaled back my other social media tremendously, and what a difference it made in terms of restoring my writing, my reading, my thinking, etc. Not to mention my state of mind. Everyone is different but I definitely found stuff like twitter destroyed my ability to think, read and write in ways that were invisible to me. That said, there is that trade off: you definitely lose reach if you do that, and reach is something that genuinely matters if you are publishing or just trying to secure employment in a creative field.


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## Umbran (May 11, 2022)

Jer said:


> Twitter is, from a design and communication perspective, really awful.




But, from an _engagement_ perspective, it is apparently freaking awesome.

Which of these do you think actually gets them money?


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## Jer (May 11, 2022)

Umbran said:


> But, from an _engagement_ perspective, it is apparently freaking awesome.
> 
> Which of these do you think actually gets them money?



I'm honestly skeptical of Twitter's financial future - it's the pet rock of the 21st century in a lot of ways. For all the talk of its importance, it's really only important because a whole lot of journalists use it to promote themselves.  Facebook's (sorry - "Meta's") social media platforms are a lot more sticky and also they've put quite a bit of thought into always having a new one available as younger folks don't want to be on their parent's social network (though they got caught flat-footed with TikTok - Facebook/Meta is getting bloated).

I think the Twitter board is skeptical too - which is why once they figured out that Musk was serious and wasn't just trolling them (which, let's be honest, is a reasonable thing to think he might be doing) they jumped at the opportunity to sell it to him.  Taking it private and making it's profitability his and his funders problem instead of theirs is probably a load off a lot of their minds.


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## Morrus (May 11, 2022)

It does what it’s intended to do very well. It just that what it’s intended for isn’t necessarily what you want it to be intended for. That, however, isn’t a problem with Twitter.


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## Umbran (May 11, 2022)

Jer said:


> I'm honestly skeptical of Twitter's financial future - it's the pet rock of the 21st century in a lot of ways. For all the talk of its importance, it's really only important because a whole lot of journalists use it to promote themselves.




6000 tweets per second, on broad average.  About _half a billion_ tweets every day.

There are not that many journalists on the planet.


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## Jer (May 11, 2022)

Umbran said:


> 6000 tweets per second, on broad average.  About _half a billion_ tweets every day.
> 
> There are not that many journalists on the planet.



No - you're mistaking usage for importance.  Twitter is important because journalists use it and promote it.  Most folks use it as at best a timewaster and an unfiltered news feed (that last one being problematic and I guess "important" in the sense that it's a bad thing that is actively making the world a worse place).  There are many social media platforms that if they disappeared tomorrow would dramatically impact the lives of everyone using them negatively - WhatsApp, for example, is devestating to people when it goes down because it's basically their main communications platform with friends and family when they're separated.  Twitter could disappear tomorrow and nothing of value would be lost.  It's an entertainment and advertising platform, and by definition that kind of thing is just not important.


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## Janx (May 11, 2022)

Ryujin said:


> What you are describing is someone who is using the medium for a purpose other than that intended. Twitter is for short comments, not long form discussion or prose. Sure, I can use the handle of a screwdriver as a hammer, but wouldn't it be better to just use a hammer?



Indeed.

I put my work on my blog.  Then I write an intro text and post the link into my social media.

Like pretty much everybody else doing articles or what have you.

It works for me. I'm well over 4000 followers. Which isn't huge, but more than most.


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## Ryujin (May 11, 2022)

Janx said:


> Indeed.
> 
> I put my work on my blog.  Then I write an intro text and post the link into my social media.
> 
> ...



Exactly. Twitter is like a preface, not a publication medium. It's a place for 280 character mental expulsions.


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## TheAlkaizer (May 11, 2022)

doctorbadwolf said:


> This statement does not say what you seem to think it says.
> 
> It's also really bad form to accuse me of disingenuousness just because you disagree with my assessment.



Then what does it mean? My understanding is that being disingenuous is making statement or acting by putting aside relevant information that you do know. I guess it could be viewed as a form of dishonesty? Like I'd tell someone is disingenuous if they omit some relevant information that they clearly have knowledge of. That's my understanding, but again english is not my mother tongue, so I may not understand the nuance of the word.



doctorbadwolf said:


> And there is very little evidence supporting this idea. He bought his way into being called a "founder" of a company he didn't have any part in founding, and wasn't even one of the initial investors in, and then bought out the actual founders so he could position himself as "the guy who started Tesla Motors". He then hired some _actual_ engineers (I've met a few, btw, and a couple fabricators of various skillsets. He's a terrible boss.) to make a rocket company, and then let his various engineers talk shop with eachother and share ideas.
> 
> Paypal is the closest he's ever come to actually coming up with anything especially interesting.




I agree with most of what you said. As I said, I'm not a fan of him. He was absolutely born in wealth and did not found most of the business he was in. I also disagree with many of the views he put out publicly, his latest bout concerning Twitter being a good example. But it's really interesting how he has the intelligence to think laterally and move knowledge, technology and resources from one domain to another. A lot of industries struggle with issues that have been figured out elsewhere, and someone that is able to have the right people meet and connect solutions to problems are highly valuable.


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## Willie the Duck (May 11, 2022)

Morrus said:


> I mean, I think that's just the internet. And the world.



Pretty much. I remember individual online forums like this and Wizards.com back before these specialized social media products. As much as there are still toxic and troll-like behaviors going on, I think a bunch of it that used to be here up and left for Reddit and Twitter and such. Anonymity breeds nonbest behavior and worst impulses are rewarded.


Jer said:


> No - you're mistaking usage for importance.



Some things are important because people think they are important, watch it or take part in it, and therefore lend their importance to the thing. If, as the politics that keep creeping through here are any indication, Twitter played a non-trivial part in political events of the past several years. People thought Twitter was important, watched it, and it swayed their actions/beliefs/voting patterns. That's importance. Any means by which a large number of people communicate, gather, form tribes, coalesce or reinforce ideas, or otherwise establish their beliefs, ideas, opinions, and allegiances is inherently important, regardless of any outside estimation of its' quality.

That said, I also question whether Twitter really has a long term business model. Of course I have the same question about FacebMeta and it's been going on for a decade and a half, and dead tree publishing has been "on its' deathbed" for a quarter century, etc...


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## trappedslider (May 11, 2022)

Ryujin said:


> Exactly. Twitter is like a preface, not a publication medium. It's a place for 280 character mental expulsions.



I've seen a number of folks who post what would have been a blog post on Twitter. This honestly feels like old man yelling at cloud or new media is evil.

Hell, I thought discord was a terrible place for discussion, then I realize it's basically a chatroom and then it all clicked into place.


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## Bedrockgames (May 11, 2022)

Willie the Duck said:


> Pretty much. I remember individual online forums like this and Wizards.com back before these specialized social media products. As much as there are still toxic and troll-like behaviors going on, I think a bunch of it that used to be here up and left for Reddit and Twitter and such. Anonymity breeds nonbest behavior and worst impulses are rewarded.
> 
> Some things are important because people think they are important, watch it or take part in it, and therefore lend their importance to the thing. If, as the politics that keep creeping through here are any indication, Twitter played a non-trivial part in political events of the past several years. People thought Twitter was important, watched it, and it swayed their actions/beliefs/voting patterns. That's importance. Any means by which a large number of people communicate, gather, form tribes, coalesce or reinforce ideas, or otherwise establish their beliefs, ideas, opinions, and allegiances is inherently important, regardless of any outside estimation of its' quality.
> 
> That said, I also question whether Twitter really has a long term business model. Of course I have the same question about FacebMeta and it's been going on for a decade and a half, and dead tree publishing has been "on its' deathbed" for a quarter century, etc...




There is a lot to say about a platform like Twitter. I don't think the platform is itself the issue, it is the importance we give it and how we use it. Also our understanding of how we are communicating there. One of the reasons I stopped with it, is because of its clear immediate effect on my ability to think. It was visibly impacting my memory and how well I could articulate ideas. But that is something I am sure I could also manage by just using twitter less. The bigger issue I think is twitter is new and like any new communication medium we are still very vulnerable to the way it can be exploited for rhetorical purposes (for instance, the structure of the character limit and how tweets work, really reward making a punchline rather than making a clear argument that leads to a solid conclusion: it is about winning over the crowd, whoever that crowd happens to be, with a quip or slice of wit). That can be a great platform for all kinds of creative communication. I think there is a learning curve where people need to understand how they are allowing themselves to be persuaded by humor and social pressure rather than a real presentation of ideas. At the moment, it tends to bring out the worst in people in my opinion, so I don't really want to be on there. Basically been off it for two years. A lot happier since I left. 

All mediums take time for us to adjust to. Doesn't make the medium itself bad. Over time I think they lose their power: propaganda posters don't have the sway they once did, we can see how they manipulate quite clearly. And mediums always introduce changes (people used to tell and remember stories much differently before writing; a lot of unrest followed the widespread use of the printing press). Some of that will just be inevitable. 

For right now though, I have just found the best thing for  me, if I want to be productive with the things I love doing, is to unplug for the most part. Settle back into a pre-internet pace of life.


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## doctorbadwolf (May 11, 2022)

TheAlkaizer said:


> Then what does it mean? My understanding is that being disingenuous is making statement or acting by putting aside relevant information that you do know. I guess it could be viewed as a form of dishonesty? Like I'd tell someone is disingenuous if they omit some relevant information that they clearly have knowledge of. That's my understanding, but again english is not my mother tongue, so I may not understand the nuance of the word.



Right, thus you calling me dishonest for disagreeing with you. Which is bad form.


TheAlkaizer said:


> I agree with most of what you said. As I said, I'm not a fan of him. He was absolutely born in wealth and did not found most of the business he was in. I also disagree with many of the views he put out publicly, his latest bout concerning Twitter being a good example. But it's really interesting how he has the intelligence to think laterally and move knowledge, technology and resources from one domain to another. A lot of industries struggle with issues that have been figured out elsewhere, and someone that is able to have the right people meet and connect solutions to problems are highly valuable.



There is nothing valuable about Elon Musk. The world would be better if he'd been born middle class and gotten a job in fabricating or something. He's a net drain. 

But more specifically, he didn't do anything innovative, he just took credit for what other people have done. That's it.


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## gamerprinter (May 11, 2022)

Have you seen my posts of anything, anywhere - they don't call them walls of text for nothing. Any platform where character limit is one of the primary functions is not condusive to anything that I might post. So I've never used Twitter, I've never looked at it, and have no draw to look. Twitter is a complete non-issue with me. So whether Elon owns it or not, I have no opinion nor care...


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## Bedrockgames (May 11, 2022)

gamerprinter said:


> Have you seen my posts of anything, anywhere - they don't call them walls of text for nothing. Any platform where character limit is one of the primary functions is not condusive to anything that I might post. So I've never used Twitter, I've never looked at it, and have no draw to look. Twitter is a complete non-issue with me. So whether Elon owns it or not, I have no opinion nor care...




I too tend towards wall of text. I think the specific politics and matter of who owns it is less relevant than how we use it as a society (as people noted journalists have it power by deciding Twitter conversations were important and meaningful). It is has become a bit of a media force multiplier I think is the issue


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## Older Beholder (May 12, 2022)

It's a handy search engine for collective consciousness.
And if you mainly follow cute cat pic accounts it's a pretty awesome place.


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## payn (May 12, 2022)

The Lizard Wizard said:


> It's a handy search engine for collective consciousness.
> And if you mainly follow cute cat pic accounts it's a pretty awesome place.



I thought "people's cats, and racist rants" was Facebooks domain?


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## Asisreo (May 12, 2022)

JarooAshstaff said:


> Its time to turn Twitter off



But where are you going to experience discussions about the homoerotic tendencies of cartoon characters where someone in the comments inexplicably has a high-quality artwork displaying those tendencies with viscerally realistic genitalia of the fantasy beast they represent. 

I'm not scarred, you're scarred!


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## Older Beholder (May 12, 2022)

payn said:


> I thought "people's cats, and racist rants" was Facebooks domain?




There's some overlap between the two. 

One thing about Twitter is that it isn't a great place for self promotion, which I see as another positive.


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## Umbran (May 12, 2022)

Jer said:


> No - you're mistaking usage for importance.  Twitter is important because journalists use it and promote it.




With respect, I think you are incredibly incorrect there, but discussing it would violate our rules on politics.

But, I suggest the people there who have had the greatest impact on the world at large are most certainly not engaged in journalism.


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## AnotherGuy (May 12, 2022)

The Lizard Wizard said:


> And if you mainly follow cute cat pic accounts it's a pretty awesome place.



I do that with Insta - amazing animals and beautiful homes & sites around the world.
Great way for fueling imagination.


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## beancounter (May 12, 2022)

I've never used Twitter, and I don't need to - because so many people quote Twitter post on other social media platforms. I'm "exposed to Twitter whether I like it or not 

One of my FB friends uses FB almost exclusively to share Twitter post -  which is a bit ironic.


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## Snarf Zagyg (May 12, 2022)

Twitter is like a play that changes every day. And every day on twitter there is one main character in the play. 

The goal is to never be it.


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## payn (May 12, 2022)

beancounter said:


> I've never used Twitter, and I don't need to - because so many people quote Twitter post on other social media platforms. I'm "exposed to Twitter whether I like it or not
> 
> One of my FB friends uses FB almost exclusively to share Twitter post -  which is a bit ironic.



One of the bennies of EN World is getting all D&D tweets posted and more!


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## Bedrockgames (May 12, 2022)

Umbran said:


> With respect, I think you are incredibly incorrect there, but discussing it would violate our rules on politics.
> 
> But, I suggest the people there who have had the greatest impact on the world at large are most certainly not engaged in journalism.




I don't want to get into the politics of this either. If I understand your meaning (and it is very possible I am missing who you are referring to). I think it is possible for both to be true: there are a lot of bad actors online, but the media in general has also given twitter more relevance and attention than it probably ought to have. This seems especially true to me when I read a story and part of the story identifies a trend, mood or opinion happening in the country, by pointing to tweets, but when you dig in, it's like a handful of people and most of them aren't even using their real names. I think we have just done a bad job as a culture, putting the opinion of people on twitter into perspective. But again, I think that comes with time. It is a new media and new media seems to be more dazzling and have greater persuasive power when it first emerges.


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## MarkB (May 12, 2022)

The only time I check Twitter is when ENworld is down, to see what status updates Morris has posted.


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## TheAlkaizer (May 12, 2022)

doctorbadwolf said:


> Right, thus you calling me dishonest for disagreeing with you. Which is bad form.



I took a full day to ponder on this and talked with an anglophone colleague of mine. He echoed what you said. And now that I'm thinking back on it, it absolutely was too strong of a statement. It wasn't my intention to come off like this, but it's still what happened and what I projected.

I apologize for my bad form, and I'll be careful in the future. Thank you for exchanging with me and giving me the opportunity of thinking back on it!


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## Morrus (May 12, 2022)

I’ll leave this open as it’s a valid discussion, but I’d ask that you ignore the OP’s posts. He’s a recurring troll who keeps making alts and is mainly just trying to stir up trouble.


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## dragoner (May 12, 2022)

Twitter is ok, I use it socially. Now business-wise, facebook is the best by far, that and dtrpg have been 99% of where the sales, and advertising goes, reddit a distant second, and if there is a third, maybe it's twitter, though I have scaled back the effort there. Discord is in the somewhere, nothing special though.


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## Morrus (May 12, 2022)

dragoner said:


> Twitter is ok, I use it socially. Now business-wise, facebook is the best by far, that and dtrpg have been 99% of where the sales, and advertising goes, reddit a distant second, and if there is a third, maybe it's twitter, though I have scaled back the effort there. Discord is in the somewhere, nothing special though.



Facebook is by far the world's best ad platform at the moment. It's not even close.


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## dragoner (May 12, 2022)

Morrus said:


> Facebook is by far the world's best ad platform at the moment. It's not even close.



Yes, I tried various other platforms, websites, over the last year or so; and you are correct, it is not even close.


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## Sacrosanct (May 12, 2022)

Morrus said:


> I’ll leave this open as it’s a valid discussion, but I’d ask that you ignore the OP’s posts. He’s a recurring troll who keeps making alts and is mainly just trying to stir up trouble.



I suspected as much.  It's always a red flag when a new poster is very argumentative with certain people like they had a history, but obviously couldn't have if the poster was truly a new poster.


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## Umbran (May 12, 2022)

Sacrosanct said:


> I suspected as much.  It's always a red flag when ...




So, like, you want to actively tell people how they get discovered?  Might want to think that through a little more...


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## Bedrockgames (May 12, 2022)

Sacrosanct said:


> I suspected as much.  It's always a red flag when a new poster is very argumentative with certain people like they had a history, but obviously couldn't have if the poster was truly a new poster.




I have a goldfish memory. I can't remember posters who argue with me, even when they are using the same names. If they are making whole new identities that is going to go completely over my head.


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## doctorbadwolf (May 12, 2022)

TheAlkaizer said:


> I took a full day to ponder on this and talked with an anglophone colleague of mine. He echoed what you said. And now that I'm thinking back on it, it absolutely was too strong of a statement. It wasn't my intention to come off like this, but it's still what happened and what I projected.
> 
> I apologize for my bad form, and I'll be careful in the future. Thank you for exchanging with me and giving me the opportunity of thinking back on it!



I appreciate it.  

English is a dumb language, speaking as a native speaker. I’m glad you indicated it wasn’t your mother tongue.


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## Sacrosanct (May 13, 2022)

Umbran said:


> So, like, you want to actively tell people how they get discovered?  Might want to think that through a little more...



I didn't think I was revealing anything revolutionary or secret.  If I see a new account and that person starts arguing with the same people in the same arguments as someone who was banned, I'd think it would be fairly obvious.


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## dragoner (May 13, 2022)

Sacrosanct said:


> I didn't think I was revealing anything revolutionary or secret.  If I see a new account and that person starts arguing with the same people in the same arguments as someone who was banned, I'd think it would be fairly obvious.



More than that, one can tell their individual writing style. Kicking trolls is like forum maintenance though, they always come back, for a while at least, until there are new ones.


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## nedjer (May 13, 2022)

Post content on your site/ blog, place links and wip on multiple platforms and avoid sticking all your eggs in one social media basket is what my granny taught me. She was a 12th lvl Cook with a proficiency in making most excellent apple crumbles and so clearly much wiser than Elon.


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## trappedslider (May 13, 2022)

one of the many cool accounts i follow


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## Umbran (May 13, 2022)

Sacrosanct said:


> I didn't think I was revealing anything revolutionary or secret.




Secrecy isn't the issue.  

People, by and large, aren't great at analyzing or reviewing the details of their own work.  Having done that work, they tend to elide over the details, even if flaws are plain to others.  Authors have editors, and manufacturing has Quality Assurance for this reason.

By going over the flaws in a troll's approach, you are effectively acting as Troll Quality Assurance.  Please don't do that work for them.


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## Mercurius (May 18, 2022)

The Lizard Wizard said:


> It's a handy search engine for collective consciousness.
> And if you mainly follow cute cat pic accounts it's a pretty awesome place.



This. I find twitter depressing, for reasons related to your first sentence, but it is also quite interesting for the same reasons. Plus, there's no quicker way to get a sense of what is going on in the collective consciousness, be it Heard-and-Depp or the latest news or propaganda.

As for the second, my partner loves such accounts and has turned me on to them - often PMing me all sorts of pictures of possums, goats, cats, etc. I recently discovered "Red Pandas Every Day" and my life is better for it.


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## doctorbadwolf (May 18, 2022)

Mercurius said:


> This. I find twitter depressing, for reasons related to your first sentence, but it is also quite interesting for the same reasons. Plus, there's no quicker way to get a sense of what is going on in the collective consciousness, be it Heard-and-Depp or the latest news or propaganda.
> 
> As for the second, my partner loves such accounts and has turned me on to them - often PMing me all sorts of pictures of possums, goats, cats, etc. I recently discovered "Red Pandas Every Day" and my life is better for it.



Gotta love having a wise partner. 

The stuff my wife recomends to me on instagram is often somewhat less....SFW, but lots of cute hedgehogs and kittens and such. Is very good for my mental health!


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## trappedslider (May 18, 2022)

Mercurius said:


> As for the second, my partner loves such accounts and has turned me on to them - often PMing me all sorts of pictures of possums, goats, cats, etc. I recently discovered "Red Pandas Every Day" and my life is better for it.



I tend to follow parental Twitter which has very amusing stories of kids/teens/classmates of those kids particularly https://twitter.com/MumInBits whose posting of the adventures of her daughter's classmate named Freya should be made into a book. For example


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## wicked cool (May 18, 2022)

If what Musk has revealed (recent twitter post) is Twitter even a real place. If 1/2 of a certain government officials followers are deemed bots than what is Twitter really? IF as im only speculating they could be in big legal trouble. By creating fake bots you are inflating your real value to stockholders and advertisers etc


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## Ryujin (May 19, 2022)

wicked cool said:


> If what Musk has revealed (recent twitter post) is Twitter even a real place. If 1/2 of a certain government officials followers are deemed bots than what is Twitter really? IF as im only speculating they could be in big legal trouble. By creating fake bots you are inflating your real value to stockholders and advertisers etc



People do it on Youtube all the time. Hell, some guys essentially stole the name of a channel run by a couple of my friends, then bought a few thousand followers to make sure they got higher billing in searches.


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## nyvinter (May 19, 2022)

wicked cool said:


> If what Musk has revealed (recent twitter post) is Twitter even a real place. If 1/2 of a certain government officials followers are deemed bots than what is Twitter really? IF as im only speculating they could be in big legal trouble. By creating fake bots you are inflating your real value to stockholders and advertisers etc



Bots gathered around famous people doesn't really affect how people use it as such. So yes, it's still a real place as much as the next Internet site.

It might affect the ego of Musk that he's lumped in politicians with made up followers, but for people who post about science fiction books, possums in funny hats, micro fiction, wikipedia moderation issues, or portrait photography those bots are a non-issue and far less destructive than bigoted trolls. Just like the rest of Internet.


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## South by Southwest (May 19, 2022)

wicked cool said:


> If what Musk has revealed (recent twitter post) *is Twitter even a real place.*



It never was.


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## Lanefan (May 19, 2022)

"Social" media, isn't.


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## Bedrockgames (May 19, 2022)

South by Southwest said:


> It never was.




Twitter has always been a very insulated conversation. So has facebook. Which is fine. There isn't anything wrong with that sort of thing. But the problem in my mind is the way those opinions have been presented as relevant or important. Thankfully it happens less and less. But I still remember articles in major papers siting minor tweets as if they reflected the opinions of a broad swath of the public. It is also the kind of place that to me, feels a lot like junior high school. People who know how to use the platform to attack others, whip people into a frenzy around others, are usually the ones who get popular. But they often end up also being the ones who become the target of those frenzies.


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## wicked cool (May 19, 2022)

nyvinter said:


> Bots gathered around famous people doesn't really affect how people use it as such. So yes, it's still a real place as much as the next Internet site.
> 
> It might affect the ego of Musk that he's lumped in politicians with made up followers, but for people who post about science fiction books, possums in funny hats, micro fiction, wikipedia moderation issues, or portrait photography those bots are a non-issue and far less destructive than bigoted trolls. Just like the rest of Internet.



but a bot isnt a real user. is it is being counted as a total

Lets  say hollywood A actress has 40 million followers but 10 million are bots. The major companies that sponsor that actress are looking at the 40 million (mountain dew, clothes etc).  investors etc are looking at that. Its has nothing to do with musks ego it has to do with the real value. You can go to jail for overinflating assets . you have lied to top stockholders , banks that have lent you money etc. This could crush the stock.


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## Bedrockgames (May 19, 2022)

nyvinter said:


> Bots gathered around famous people doesn't really affect how people use it as such. So yes, it's still a real place as much as the next Internet site.
> 
> It might affect the ego of Musk that he's lumped in politicians with made up followers, but for people who post about science fiction books, possums in funny hats, micro fiction, wikipedia moderation issues, or portrait photography those bots are a non-issue and far less destructive than bigoted trolls. Just like the rest of Internet.




I see the bot issue as a separate thing from the 'twitter isn't a real place' argument. The latter always struck me as a reminder that twitter is just a place on the internet, that doesn't necessarily reflect the attitudes and views of the broader world; that it is literally not a real place (it exists on the internet) and that you can unplug from it and resume your real life: it is basically telling people they don't need to enslave their mind and opinions to social media platforms. Friends, family, Mom and dad are more real and relevant to your life than @horseofwar32. Relationships on a social media network are not the same as those in real life, and I think that is why people are so capable of being cruel to one another online, especially in places like twitter and facebook.


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## Mannahnin (May 19, 2022)

wicked cool said:


> but a bot isnt a real user. is it is being counted as a total
> 
> Lets  say hollywood A actress has 40 million followers but 10 million are bots. The major companies that sponsor that actress are looking at the 40 million (mountain dew, clothes etc).  investors etc are looking at that. Its has nothing to do with musks ego it has to do with the real value. You can go to jail for overinflating assets . you have lied to top stockholders , banks that have lent you money etc. This could crush the stock.



Right.  The percentage of users which are bots impacts advertising value, for one of the most prominent things, as well as the quality of general discourse.  I saw a recent comment that Twitter estimates their bot user percentage as around 5%, whereas Musk just did some sort of rough analysis that came up with around 20%.  This has a direct impact on valuation.


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## nyvinter (May 19, 2022)

Bedrockgames said:


> Relationships on a social media network are not the same as those in real life, and I think that is why people are so capable of being cruel to one another online, especially in places like twitter and facebook.



No, that depends on how you see people through an anonymous lens. They're just removing the mask as social media makes that easy and shows you how they treat people they do not know. "Internet isn't real" is what assholes say to justify behaving like assholes as people online is not that different from people one was penpals with in school; it's a real relationship separated by vast distances. Not seeing it as real is what create numbness farms like 4chan.

But the bot issues are a little interesting, because there are several bots on social media. The padding of followers one is an issue for advertising yes, but also advertising is an issue for Internet that most people have been trained to ignore and see past — with social media far more and more ignore those numbers and go with engagements, the follower bots don't affect those at all.

Then there's the post animal pic bots and bots boosting particular subjects — archillect comes to mind. There quite a lot of those. The ones we should be concerned are the phishing bots, but Musk don't care about those or their victims as he's not been phished himself.


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## Ryujin (May 19, 2022)

nyvinter said:


> No, that depends on how you see people through an anonymous lens. They're just removing the mask as social media makes that easy and shows you how they treat people they do not know. "Internet isn't real" is what assholes say to justify behaving like assholes as people online is not that different from people one was penpals with in school; it's a real relationship separated by vast distances. Not seeing it as real is what create numbness farms like 4chan.
> 
> But the bot issues are a little interesting, because there are several bots on social media. The padding of followers one is an issue for advertising yes, but also advertising is an issue for Internet that most people have been trained to ignore and see past — with social media far more and more ignore those numbers and go with engagements, the follower bots don't affect those at all.
> 
> Then there's the post animal pic bots and bots boosting particular subjects — archillect comes to mind. There quite a lot of those. The ones we should be concerned are the phishing bots, but Musk don't care about those or their victims as he's not been phished himself.




Oscar Wilde said it best, over 100 years ago. Take away consequence and you'll see who someone really is.

“Man is least himself when he talks in his own person. Give him a mask and he'll tell you the truth”


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## Bedrockgames (May 19, 2022)

nyvinter said:


> No, that depends on how you see people through an anonymous lens. They're just removing the mask as social media makes that easy and shows you how they treat people they do not know. "Internet isn't real" is what assholes say to justify behaving like assholes as people online is not that different from people one was




We are kind of talking about different uses of the expression. Not real refers to the platform, not the people on it (which is why I separated it out from the bot issue). I am not using it to say that the people online aren't real (otherwise I would not be concerned by the cruelty that happens on twiter). I am not talking about people who say it isn't real, so that means they can mistreat people online. I am talking about people who have been mistreated on line and get off because they realize it isn't real life, that people think and behave differently in online environments and it isn't conducive to empathy at the moment. That isn't real life, and that even many of the things people say there aren't even always what they really think (they are things people say to promote themselves, to play to what they think others want them to say, etc). Saying it is not a real place, is a way to help keep the voices on twitter out of your mind when they disruptive to your life or your way of thinking. I do give people the benefit of the doubt. I don't think we are seeing who people really are, I just think the worst part of them is being unleashed. I think a lot of people who see themselves as wonderful people are capable of more cruelty than they realize in the right circumstances. I have made a point of being as forgiving as I can towards the people who have been bad to me online, and hope they can eventually understand what they are doing is affecting real people. Twitter is a very negative place in my opinion and I think an easy way to rebuke that negativity is with a phrase like "it isn't even real" because in many ways it is not.


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## Ryujin (May 19, 2022)

Bedrockgames said:


> We are kind of talking about different uses of the expression. Not real refers to the platform, not the people on it (which is why I separated it out from the bot issue). I am not using it to say that the people online aren't real (otherwise I would not be concerned by the cruelty that happens on twiter). I am not talking about people who say it isn't real, so that means they can mistreat people online. I am talking about people who have been mistreated on line and get off because they realize it isn't real life, that people think and behave differently in online environments and it isn't conducive to empathy at the moment. That isn't real life, and that even many of the things people say there aren't even always what they really think (they are things people say to promote themselves, to play to what they think others want them to say, etc). Saying it is not a real place, is a way to help keep the voices on twitter out of your mind when they disruptive to your life or your way of thinking. I do give people the benefit of the doubt. I don't think we are seeing who people really are, I just think the worst part of them is being unleashed. I think a lot of people who see themselves as wonderful people are capable of more cruelty than they realize in the right circumstances. I have made a point of being as forgiving as I can towards the people who have been bad to me online, and hope they can eventually understand what they are doing is affecting real people. Twitter is a very negative place in my opinion and I think an easy way to rebuke that negativity is with a phrase like "it isn't even real" because in many ways it is not.



I would say that if you are being a good person just because of potential consequences, and that you'd behave badly if those perceived consequences are removed, then you really aren't a good person after all.


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## Bedrockgames (May 19, 2022)

Ryujin said:


> I would say that if you are being a good person just because of potential consequences, and that you'd behave badly if those perceived consequences are removed, then you really aren't a good person after all.




I don't it is about the removal of consequences. I think it is about not having a real person directly in front of you and losing empathy towards them because the internet makes it easy to project whatever we want onto them. I think it is a very complicated thing. But I also think it is very easy to start labeling people as good or bad or whatever and then open the flood gates of your anger towards them, or be moved by a fear of crowds to join in the anger. Would flesh this out more but I only have a moment unfortunately


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## South by Southwest (May 19, 2022)

Bedrockgames said:


> *I don't it is about the removal of consequences. I think it is about not having a real person directly in front of you and losing empathy towards them because the internet makes it easy to project whatever we want onto them.*



I think that's exactly right. I consider the Twitterverse equivalent to the phenomena of idle gossip and road rage both hopped up on some _really_ strong crack cocaine.


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## Umbran (May 19, 2022)

Ryujin said:


> Oscar Wilde said it best, over 100 years ago. Take away consequence and you'll see who someone really is.
> 
> “Man is least himself when he talks in his own person. Give him a mask and he'll tell you the truth”




While poetic, Oscar Wilde wasn't a behaviorist.  I don't think what he said applies to Twitter.

The whole idea of an "alpha wolf" was the result of watching non-domesticated animals in captivity, forced into unnatural social situations.  The resulting behavior wasn't how wolves "really are" - it is how wolves are in an artificial situation they aren't set up to handle.  

Twitter, and social media in general, is not a _natural_ social situation for humans.  It eliminates many or most of the social cues we primates use (and indeed _depend on_) for our normal socialization and interaction.  The result is _NOT_ "who we really are", any more than it was so for the wolves.

When you (generic you, not you, Ryujin, personally) go to a party at a friend's house, you naturally and unconsciously use the vocal tones, facial expressions, and body language of those around you to moderate your own behavior.  When those cues are removed, what results isn't the "real you".  It is more like you in a _dysfunctional state_.


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## Umbran (May 19, 2022)

Ryujin said:


> I would say that if you are being a good person just because of potential consequences, and that you'd behave badly if those perceived consequences are removed, then you really aren't a good person after all.




So, here's evidence that we all see pretty much every day.  EN World itself.

EN World is a place where we use fake names - we have masks - but we are not without consequences.  If you misbehave, there's a bunch of stuff that may happen to you that you don't like, up to and including permanent banishment.  And, when those consequences fall, many people are _very upset_ by that.  The consequences matter to them.

But people still behave badly, often even after warning that consequences may fall.  So, clearly, conscious consideration of consequences isn't really the only thing that keeps the lid on people.


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## South by Southwest (May 19, 2022)

Umbran said:


> But people still behave badly, often even after warning that consequences may fall.  So, clearly, conscious consideration of consequences isn't really the only thing that keeps the lid on people.



And there's a bit more here on top of that, I think: along with everything of social cues from body language, physical position, etc., there's a quite immediate instinctive sense of the _importance_ of the person in front of you when you're in person. When they're on screen even in high definition, they still feel separated from us and so become less of a priority. When they're right in front of us in person, though, there's a felt immediacy of their moral importance for our conduct. The ways people so willingly treat each other on social media do not even resemble the ways we'll interact when we're sitting together around a lunch table and someone asks us to pass the mayonnaise.

This is why I likened it to road rage: when we're not ensconced inside our motorized metal boxes, we would never treat other people like that. But in morning traffic we'll do it every day.


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## Ryujin (May 19, 2022)

Umbran said:


> So, here's evidence that we all see pretty much every day.  EN World itself.
> 
> EN World is a place where we use fake names - we have masks - but we are not without consequences.  If you misbehave, there's a bunch of stuff that may happen to you that you don't like, up to and including permanent banishment.  And, when those consequences fall, many people are _very upset_ by that.  The consequences matter to them.
> 
> But people still behave badly, often even after warning that consequences may fall.  So, clearly, conscious consideration of consequences isn't really the only thing that keeps the lid on people.



But no one is going to feed you your teeth for what you say here, for example. And as we've all seen, even as recently as the past week, the consequences can be fleeting if you're willing to make another account.


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## Bedrockgames (May 19, 2022)

Ryujin said:


> But no one is going to feed you your teeth for what you say here, for example. And as we've all seen, even as recently as the past week, the consequences can be fleeting if you're willing to make another account.




I do think a major difference between online interactions and real life ones is there aren't immediate consequences because you aren't in the person's presence. That can mean you don't have to deal directly with their anger, but also you don't have to see the pain in their eyes from what you say (I think we've all seen someone say something biting to a person online they would never say to someone in front of them: and not because they are afraid of being hit because but because they wouldn't want to hurt the feelings of a person). Something about being online I think interferes with that.

One thing worth noting about getting teeth punched: even in real life, people can't just punch out other peoples teeth because they crossed a verbal line. The sometimes do, but I don't think that is the thing generally enforcing the social order. This is obviously going to vary by state and there is the whole 'fighting words' thing but just as a legal matter (at least in the US where I live) it isn't wise to punch someone unless you are doing it to physically defend yourself because you could end up getting charged with a crime. And punches can be dangerous too. I remember a young man who got killed when I was in middle school because he and his friends were throwing eggs at a car. The driver got out, punched him in the face, and drove off. But the guy ended up dying.


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## Ryujin (May 19, 2022)

Bedrockgames said:


> I do think a major difference between online interactions and real life ones is there aren't immediate consequences because you aren't in the person's presence. That can mean you don't have to deal directly with their anger, but also you don't have to see the pain in their eyes from what you say (I think we've all seen someone say something biting to a person online they would never say to someone in front of them: and not because they are afraid of being hit because but because they wouldn't want to hurt the feelings of a person). Something about being online I think interferes with that.
> 
> One thing worth noting about getting teeth punched: even in real life, people can't just punch out other peoples teeth because they crossed a verbal line. The sometimes do, but I don't think that is the thing generally enforcing the social order. This is obviously going to vary by state and there is the whole 'fighting words' thing but just as a legal matter (at least in the US where I live) it isn't wise to punch someone unless you are doing it to physically defend yourself because you could end up getting charged with a crime. And punches can be dangerous too. I remember a young man who got killed when I was in middle school because he and his friends were throwing eggs at a car. The driver got out, punched him in the face, and drove off. But the guy ended up dying.



I went extreme, to make the point, but I stand by the basic premise.


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## dragoner (May 20, 2022)

Like anywhere, it has to be curated, though I use twitter to communicate with friends, and family around the world. It works great for what it is, I don't have any complaints on that level.


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