Tag Archives: Twitter

Threats to free speech on Twitter

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The EFF summarizes (and analyzes) recent threats to free speech on Twitter. Worth a full read.

Excerpt:

In a December 14th article in the New York Times, anonymous U.S. officials claimed they “may have the legal authority to demand that Twitter close” a Twitter account associated with the militant Somali group Al-Shabaab. A week later, the Telegraph reported that Sen. Joe Lieberman contacted Twitter to remove two “propaganda” accounts allegedly run by the Taliban. More recently, an Israeli law firm threatened to sue Twitter if they did not remove accounts run by Hezbollah.

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Censorship of social media proposed in the UK (updated)

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When people are using social media for violence we need to stop them. We are working with the police, the intelligence services and industry to look at whether it would be right to stop people communicating via these websites and services when we know they are plotting violence, disorder and criminality. Free flow of information can be used for good, but it can also be used for ill.

– David Cameron, British Prime Minister calling for censorship of social media, which he claims helped foster the riots in the UK.

This is so wrong-headed it is crazy. Free speech is free speech, whether it is online or not. Represive regimes have been brought down by social media. See, e.g., Egypt. So when a democratic government doesn’t like the results, it attempts to ban free speech.  Surely this will be the approach cited by dictators when they choose to shut down social media and the Internet generally.

And yes, free speech has consequences. But any rationale person believes that the costs of free speech are greatly outweighed by the benefits.

This is nothing like yelling fire in a crowded theater, and if one believe it is, then existing laws are certainly sufficient to handle the problem.

Update: More from the BBC.

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Tech quote of the day

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This didn’t have anything to do with Twitter and Facebook. This had to do with people’s dignity, people’s pride. People are not able to feed their families.

– Richard Engel, reporter in Egypt, debunking the claim that the revolution in Egypt is driven by technology.

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Political quote of the day 3

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Over Anchorage, AK. Looking everywhere but can’t see Russia from here. Will keep you updated as search continues. http://twitpic.com/2mvxod

– CA Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger, during a tour of Alaska, tweaking Sarah Palin on Twitter. Check responses on her behalf here.

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Tech quote of the day

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(Via Quotation of the Day mailing list)

I think it’s still within our power — before social media and the internet completely slice our brains into tiny little packets of jelly that are only good for reading 40 words at a time and assimilating tiny bits of information — to realize that we’re losing something. And that it’s important to step back — to know ourselves better, to know the people around us better.

– Gary Shteyngart, novelist. By the way, I am currently reading Shteyngart’s first novel, The Russian Debutante’s Handbook. Terrific.

First killer app for the iPad?

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As with any platform, the iPad creates a new experience for users and opportunities for creative developers to create entirely new and compelling applications. While several apps for the iPad have been extremely popular (like the ABC player app and the terrific Netflix streaming app), in my view the first true “killer app” for the iPad is likely to be Flipboard.

Flipboard (iTunes link, free) provides a magazine like reading experience pulling in content from user selected subject matter groupings. It also allows users to enter their Facebook and Twitter account information and Flipboard then pulls the content and displays it in an easy-t0-read format. With Twitter feeds, for example, the app not only pulls in the feed, but also if a tweet includes a link to a photo or website or video, that linked content is automatically displayed. Very sweet.

Be advised that there is a crush of users trying to activate Flipboard now. The company has posted information here. In addition, some question whether Flipboard can legally pull and display the content from other websites.

Epic Fail

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If you spend any time at all online, and especially on Twitter, you know the widespread use of “epic fail” as a perjorative indicating not just a failure, but a failure complete in its wrongness. The derivation of this term is covered in some detail on today’s New York Times’ On Language column.

In a few years’ time, the use of fail as an interjection caught on to such an extent that particularly egregious objects of ridicule required an even stronger barb: major fail, überfail, massive fail or, most popular of all, epic fail. The intensifying adjectives hinted that fail was becoming a new kind of noun: not simply a synonym for failure but, rather, a derisive label to slap on a miscue that is eminently mockable in its stupidity or wrongheadedness. Online cynics deploy fail as a countable noun (“That’s such a fail!”) and also as a mass noun that treats failure as an abstract quality: the offending party is often said to be full of fail or made of fail.

Also related to Twitter is today’s column by Virginia Heffernan regarding the use of #hastags on the service.

State Department asks help from Twitter

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The United States State Department asked Twitter operators to delay a scheduled maintenance downtime in order to allow the service to continue providing critical communication in Iran during the protests over a contested election. Talk about a seal of approval for a service’s necessity.

The U.S. State Department contacted the social networking service Twitter over the weekend to urge it to delay a planned upgrade that could have cut daytime service to Iranians, a U.S. official said on Tuesday.

(h/t Andrew Sullivan)

By the way, Andrew Sullivan is running a constant stream of the best info from Iran on his website The Daily Dish.

Is Apple buying Twitter?

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According to Valleywag, talks are underway.

Facebook tried to buy Twitter. Google and Microsoft have been giving the red-hot Internet-messaging startup the eye. But we hear it’s Apple that’s closest to sealing a deal, possibly for as much as $700 million.

A source who’s plugged into the Valley’s deal scene and has been recruited by Apple for a senior position says Apple and Twitter are in serious negotiations, with the goal of unveiling a deal by June 8, when Apple’s annual Worldwide Developers Conference launches in San Jose.

Harry McCraken doesn’t think so.

Writing for the Internet 101

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Great syllabus and overview of a new required course for the well-educated: Writing for Nonreaders in the Postprint Era (via McSweeney’s). Excerpt:

As print takes its place alongside smoke signals, cuneiform, and hollering, there has emerged a new literary age, one in which writers no longer need to feel encumbered by the paper cuts, reading, and excessive use of words traditionally associated with the writing trade. Writing for Nonreaders in the Postprint Era focuses on the creation of short-form prose that is not intended to be reproduced on pulp fibers.

Instant messaging. Twittering. Facebook updates. These 21st-century literary genres are defining a new “Lost Generation” of minimalists who would much rather watch Lost on their iPhones than toil over long-winded articles and short stories. Students will acquire the tools needed to make their tweets glimmer with a complete lack of forethought, their Facebook updates ring with self-importance, and their blog entries shimmer with literary pithiness. All without the restraints of writing in complete sentences. w00t! w00t! Throughout the course, a further paring down of the Hemingway/Stein school of minimalism will be emphasized, limiting the superfluous use of nouns, verbs, adverbs, adjectives, conjunctions, gerunds, and other literary pitfalls.