With Meta beginning to test federation, there's a lot of discussion as to whether we should preemptively defederate with Threads. I made a post about the question, and it seems that opinions differ a lot among people on Kbin. There were a lot of arguments for and against regarding ads, privacy, and content quality, but I don't...
I feel the post doesn't really address my concerns.
Really? You think Threads will take over and rule Mastodon? Threads is its own platform, users on the fediverse can still join Mastodon #servers of their choice and leave. I expect we'l see plenty of anti #threads Mastodon servers pop up. If Threads were to somehow get an influence in Mastodon, just switch to #lemmy switch to #pixelfed switch to #firefish So many choices.
This seems to not really understand the risk Threads poses. Threads is its own platform, yes, but it will dominate the visible content of any instance that federates with it. It's very dangerous to depend on a massive, profit-driven corporation for activity on the fediverse, as the things we value on the fediverse (decentralization, transparency, even distribution of content between instances, etc.) go against the corporation's motives. Meta does not stand to benefit from any of the things we value, and most of the Threads userbase (i.e. casual Instagram users) probably won't notice or care about federation. Meta does benefit if everyone depends on them for content, as then they can pull people to Threads just by defederating. People will choose to go to Threads where the amount of activity is what they're used to over staying on their Mastodon instance after activity has plummeted and they can't see most of the people they follow.
This is a big one. Meta might capture the mainstrean fediverse. Lets just be real the average regular internet user wasn't going to join Mastodon in the first place. Not that they wouldn't want to it just isn't on their list next to #facebook#instagram#tiktok#youtube#discord or even #twitter . Actually I take what Meta is doing as a compliment to the fediverse. Remember Twitter at one time under #elon#elonmusk banned the talk of Mastodon or something like that. Threads might not have our interests at heart but they are already mainstream so why should they not allow their users be federated with us?
Yes, there are definitely a lot of people that the fediverse is just never going to appeal to. But of those who are interested in the fediverse, more will be inclined to join Threads due to it having most of the content & just requiring an Instagram login. There is a pool of people out there who will try out the fediverse if they're introduced to it — that's how we all got here — and if people can interact with the big Mastodon, Kbin, etc. instances from Threads, many will choose to do that when they wouldn't have otherwise.
"Free speech absolutist" allegedly fires employee for raising security concerns.
Apparently Elon's version of free speech doesn't extend to employees who raise concerns about information security:
"Alan Rosa, who was Twitter’s global head of information security, filed the lawsuit late on Tuesday in New Jersey federal court, alleging breach of contract, wrongful termination and retaliation, among other claims. X Corp did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
"Rosa claims that late last year, after Musk acquired the company, he was told to cut his department’s budget for physical security by 50%...
"Rosa says he objected because the cuts would put Twitter at risk of violating a $150m settlement it entered into earlier in 2022 with the US Federal Trade Commission (FTC), which claimed Twitter had misused users’ personal information. The agreement required Twitter to implement privacy and information security controls to protect confidential data.
"He was fired days after raising those concerns, according to the lawsuit. Rosa is seeking unspecified compensatory and punitive damages, and legal fees."
I see #ElonMusk is saying that if X (formally Twitter) goes to the wall, it will be the 'advertisers [that] bankrupted the company'... once again he seems unable to see that is a symptom not the cause of X's problems; which of course lies with him.
I guess we'll be seeing another flow of folk into the #fediverse if the advertisers 'strike' continues (s many think it will).
Its an extraordinary example of billionaire hubris!
Yesterday Elon Musk told advertisers to go fuck themselves and threatened to send his mob after them if they pull their ads from Twitter/X.
Over the years, he built a reality where he was a genius who could never be wrong. But as his fantasy collides with the real world, Musk is melting down — and has the power to make us all feel the pain as he crashes back to Earth.
Paris mayor quits X platform, calling it a 'gigantic global sewer'
Paris Mayor Anne Hidalgo on Monday announced she was quitting the X platform formerly known as Twitter, calling it a "gigantic global sewer" that was "destroying our democracies" by spreading abuse and misinformation.
Apartheid Clyde wanted to feel some childhood nostalgia so he made a trip to Israel to pal around with Zionists for a day.
Last year he turned off Starlink access for Ukraine in key areas after speaking to Russian officials. Now he’s letting Israel’s far-right government decide whether human rights and medical groups in Gaza should have access to it.
I mean you could take this seriously until you remember that he called out Zuck to a cage match fight and then backed out by getting his mom to tell the internet that he hurt himself
Elon's "extremely hardcore" toxic work culture means people are forced to take Adderall without a prescription to meet their workload. Just ask SpaceX employees.
"Some SpaceX workers resorted to taking Adderall to keep up with the pace of work at the company's launch facility, and others found themselves falling asleep in the bathroom during long workweeks, a recent Reuters investigation found.
"Travis Carson, a former SpaceX worker at the company's facility in Brownsville, Texas, told Reuters some workers took Adderall — a stimulant designed to help people with ADHD improve their focus and concentration levels — without a prescription to keep up with the pace of work."
BREAKING TWITTER takes readers inside the darkly comic battle between one of the most intriguing, polarizing, influential men of our time—Elon Musk—and the company that represents our culture’s dearest hope for a shared global conversation. (sic!)
Seit einer Weile teilt @heiseonline auch Links zu Artikeln auf #Bluesky (aber nicht automatisch wie hier) und da wollte ich jetzt mal vergleichen: Über die aktuell so gehypte #TwitterAlternative sind in drei Monaten so viele auf heise.de gekommen, wie über #Mastodon an einem normalen Wochentag. #Twitter liegt weiter davor....
Ich hatte zwar einen #Twitter Account, habe diesen aber nie benutzt. Ich bin eigentlich erst auf das Format so richtig gestoßen, als der Crash mit #elonmusk los ging. Dann kam Jan Bömermann um die Ecke und Zack war ich auf Mastodon. Da gefällt es mir gut aber zwischenzeitlich gefällt es mir auf Lemmy besser.
Einen #bluesky Account habe ich nun auch. Diesen habe ich genau einmal benutzt. Das Interface ist nicht so toll, daher nutze ich lieber weiterhin Toot! und bleibe in der Fediverseblase. Bisher habe ich noch keine unfreundlichen Menschen im Fediverse getroffen. Manche Downvotes lassen sich damit erklären, dass das Thema wahrscheinlich nicht interessiert 🤷♂️ Ist das schlecht fürs Karma?
Heise bin ich gleich gefolgt, als der Verlag seine eigene Instanz eröffnet hat. Da die Posts alle von Bots kommen, sind die bei mir mittlerweile weichgezeichnet und ich müsste die immer für die Info anklicken. Zuviel Arbeit. Daher reagiere ich auf Posts mit heise Bezug, wenn diese in meiner Timeline auf Lemmy aufploppen. Sollte vielleicht auch mal statistisch erhoben werden ;)
So I just listened to Kara Swisher's interview of Ben Mezrich, author of "Breaking Twitter" which is out now I believe. Mr. Mezrich does not believe that tolerating racist people, turning Twitter into a firehose of racist conspiracy theories, and grandstanding for the worst white supremacists on the planet makes a person racist. "It's so complicated," he said to excuse leaving most of Elon's racist tweets and bigoted antics out of his semi-satirical book.
But it's not. As Kara points out, racist posturing by insincere people who should theoretically know better is, in some ways, worse than sincere outright racism. Either way, it's definitively racist behavior.
The same day that Elon Musk fired the entire Twitter team concerned with fighting election disinformation, he also endorses a post where people are being encouraged to vote for the far-right German AFD party. The AFD thanked him for his endorsement and for disbanding the team that was fighting election disinformation.
Elon lied about the monkeys — and he shouldn't be trusted to put his Neuralink chips in human brains.
"They are claiming they are going to put a safe device on the market, and that's why you should invest," Ryan Merkley at the Physicians Committee, told Wired. "And we see his lie as a way to whitewash what happened in these exploratory studies."
Really heartbreaking reading what happened to the monkeys.
People quite rightly think of Elizabeth Holmes as a fraud for making false medical claims about what the Theranos machines could do. So why aren't Elon's claims at Neuralink being held to the same level of scrutiny?
Elon Musk’s grandfather “believed that apartheid South Africa was destined to lead ‘White Christian Civilization’ in its fight against the ‘International Conspiracy’ of Jewish bankers and the ‘hordes of Coloured people’ they controlled.”
Damn, why didn’t Ashlee Vance or Walter Isaacson mention that part?
Prominent "free-speech absolutist" threatens to sue Jewish anti-hate group because it engaged in free speech he didn't like.
"Elon Musk has threatened to sue the Anti-Defamation League after accusing the civil rights group that campaigns against antisemitism and bigotry of trying to “kill” his X social media platform.
"The owner of X, formerly known as Twitter, said the ADL was trying to shut down his company by 'falsely accusing it and me of being antisemitic'."
If your list of enemies includes the ADL, then there's a more-than-reasonable chance that you're an anti-semite.
For years, the media built up Elon Musk and got the public to buy into the myth of his genius. Now the truth of who he is can’t be hidden and changing how they cover Musk isn’t enough.
The media failed us. They not only need to inform the public about the harms of Musk’s empire, but change how they cover the entire tech industry so another grifter can’t replicate his rise. They owe us nothing less.
It speaks of problematic developments under #ElonMusk and says, that for example #Nazi content is now barely moderated over there. And also that the significance of Twitter shrinks.
"Instead of unifying humanity, consciousness fractures it. Some build rockets for Mars, others die in a cult for a UFO hidden behind a comet. Both are thinking about the future of humanity, but they have wildly different views about what that future ought to be and how to get there."
This is a comment I made on a thread on Lemmy. I thought I would share it here because it sums up a lot of the thoughts I have about twitter/x, and some of the leftist and liberal leaning content creators that remain. I am open to feedback and criticism though if you think I am missing something or being unfair.
I'm forgiving of artists because most of their customer base is there, and internationally, alt platforms are even more unknown. I am somewhat forgiving of journalists who want to reach the widest amount of people possible, despite the fact that Musk has been intentionally targeting and censoring journalists he doesn't like.
I really don't get a lot of leftist or liberal content creators though. Many constantly push the message that you vote with your wallet, and discourage patronizing businesses, services, or franchises that actively hate or harm marginalized people. Yet at the same time, they are using a platform owned by some who is literally trying to make the platform as hostile to marginalized people as possible. A lot of users have left twitter because they no longer feel safe using the platform. In fact, the reason you see a lot of queer people here on fediverse is because many of them are twitter refugees.
And yet many leftist and liberal creators remain on twitter, exclusively in fact. I could understand it if they pushed some content to alts to keep within reach of users that left while still maintaining their fanbase on twitter, but many of them won't even touch any of the alternatives, much less make themselves more reachable on youtube or other social platforms. By remaining on twitter, they are encouraging their userbase to remain as well, which creates engagement, which benefits ad companies who pay Musk, who funnels that into groups and causes that undermine their audience.
At this point, It is an integrity test for me. How large is this creator's following on twitter? How often does this person post and interact on twitter? and what have they said in the past about interacting with harmful brands? What's their excuse for remaining if any, and would they had accepted that excuse if the shoe was on the other foot?
I accept some people have an addiction, and as someone who tried to leave reddit many times, I know it can be a hard one to kick. But if your brand is built on integrity, standing up for the marginalized, and being ethical with your consumption habbits, remaining active on twitter is not a good look to me.
A case for preemptively defederating with Threads (kbin.social)
With Meta beginning to test federation, there's a lot of discussion as to whether we should preemptively defederate with Threads. I made a post about the question, and it seems that opinions differ a lot among people on Kbin. There were a lot of arguments for and against regarding ads, privacy, and content quality, but I don't...
Zugriffe auf heise.de von Mastodon/Twitter/Bluesky (social.heise.de) German
Seit einer Weile teilt @heiseonline auch Links zu Artikeln auf #Bluesky (aber nicht automatisch wie hier) und da wollte ich jetzt mal vergleichen: Über die aktuell so gehypte #TwitterAlternative sind in drei Monaten so viele auf heise.de gekommen, wie über #Mastodon an einem normalen Wochentag. #Twitter liegt weiter davor....