Twitter forensics

The post "Twitter: Is this goodbye?" shot to the 30 day top spot within a few hours, prompting the K-landsnews team to bring in the follow-up scheduled for next week.

When the account became unsuspended, a brief exchange ensued at the K-landnews, we'll give you the highlights.

So, you think they censor content upfront?

Sure looks like it. The blog post gets pushed out to Twitter and Facebook. Facebook does not flinch, Twitter publishes it, then suspends the account a few minutes later.

So, are you going to complain on Twitter about Twitter? Since the account is open, why not turn around and use it to point out they are censoring?

I am not playing that kind of game.

How did you use the account?

Out of about 400 tweets, all but five or so, give or take, were snippets from blog posts plus a shortened link to the blog.

Didn't you want to export the data to have proof of your use?

I don't think it's necessary. As far as I am concerned, Twitter seems to run filters on the tweets after the tweet is published. This way, if you yell censorship, they can say "wait, it was published, that's not censorship".

There were reports that Twitter censors, for example, the German neo-nazi account, so your experience is not new.

Well, from what I know, the nazis were kicked out after the German authorities complained. The K-landnews experience is different, it indicates active, upfront, independent filtering.

The kind conspiracy nuts have talked about?

Yes. Look, I understand the charm of running stuff through a filter. It costs nothing, you can try to get an early warning system in place -- that'll look good when the control freaks of the world descend on you again, and most people won't raise hell when their account gets suspended for a day, maybe two.

A pain threshold?

Exactly. I won't rant, but you know how folks tick. If the algorithm is decent enough to make you feel "hm, maybe I should just get the account unsuspended and shut up", coupled with some PR that only talks about nazis, peadophiles and wingnuts, you have a good chance it works. Again, they need to be fast.
So, I clicked "help", asked why we were suspended, got a mail very shortly afterwards, replied with "I still don't know, was it this tweet?", and then we were unsuspended.

Do you think a person looked at your response?

I do not know, let's say I have my doubts. As a corporate operative with good developers behind me, I would not have a person look at an issue like ours, but that's just me.

Are you going to stay away from Twitter?

I may go and use it in the future if there is an issue which is hard to resolve otherwise. Take the post "Arrogant and lazy" about that official who treated the kid so badly. I tweeted this post right to one of the guys in charge of the German job center (Arbeitsagentur) bureaucrats. So many companies and orgs have buttoned down their public communication interfaces that Twitter can be the only easy way to kick them where they listen.

And what if Google censors the K-landnews one day?

(laugh) I have friends in low places. The blog is exported to a file every couple of days, and we can move if need be. Remember, it's a matter of perception and flux in the predators vs. the shoal of fishies. The dumbasses, the greed squad, and the holier than thou crowd have Google pegged as a search provider and ad giant, they don't care about Google blog content that much (unless that single idiot out there ruins it for everyone). YouTube, of course, they are all over that one. Twitter is almost realtime content, it is organizing people, and it is fast -- that is a potent mix in the business of ruling, in the "benefits of compliance versus the cost of bitching game".

What now?

I should mention that I sent the link to "Twitter: Is this goodbye" to the press folks at Twitter. TheEditor will go back to write about whatever catches his eye. There is this kinda cool, creepy post I am working on for tomorrow.