People will self-organize into teams. If you do things with others, they will generally help. If you let them police themselves, they will ban those who are causing pain.
This is part of what makes us human. Those who cannot follow those rules — who are neurodiverse — have difficulties and need our understanding. (Or we need to protect ourselves from them: the antisocial wolves are why we have warrior sheepdogs. The sheep should not be scared).
But this is not the narrative. The narrative needs editing: something that simply allowing people to talk will subvert. So Twitter, Facebook, and other places are trying to subvert this.
And they will lose market share, as surely as myspace did.
Social media captured the imagination of a generation because all of that editorial infrastructure was done away with, for better and worse. It was amazing to watch people form communities and build audiences organically.
But now the tide has turned against free speech, in so many ways. The urge to censor and control flows not just from government agencies, but from corporate management and speech-police vigilante mobs. It has become fashionable in some quarters to speak openly of crushing dissent, comparing the speech of opponents to “shouting fire in a crowded theater.” The desired remedies range from government action, to more subtle and insidious suppression by those who control the means of expression.
In the early days of social media, we were overwhelmed by the possibilities for free speech and creativity. At long last, we would have a true “free market” for ideas, with no one’s thumb on the scales! Now it’s all thumbs, everywhere you look.
We’re learning painful lessons about censorship, propaganda, and bias. One of those lessons is that our commitment to free speech cannot end with embracing the First Amendment as a shield against government censorship. It’s not good enough to say that oppression is cool, as long as the government is not directly involved, and the oppressors are subtle. Free speech is a positive ideal to be embraced, not a narrow precipice for government agencies to avoid.
Fortunately, we have means of communicating our displeasure to private companies which fail to live up to those ideals.
Well, Twitter is losing its bright people. Sinking ship, rats…
Shares of Twitter opened at $16.79 per share, dropping as low as $16.51 in morning trading, after closing at $17.84 Friday.
Twitter was downgraded on the news by analyst firm Stifel Nicolaus, from “buy” to “hold.” “While we may not be the sharpest tools in the shed, we don’t see how the departure of the heads of three major business divisions can be viewed as a positive,” the analysts wrote in a research note.
With the management shakeup, COO Adam Bain will add oversight of media, revenue-related product development and HR on an interim basis, while CTO Adam Messigner will take over engineering and consumer product, design, research and development tools, according to Dorsey.
Twitter has had a rocky ride on Wall Street since going public in late 2013. Last week, company shares spiked on rumors that New Corp was interested in acquiring or investing in Twitter, before falling again after ,News Corp dismissed the chatter as untrue.
Twitter founder Dorsey returned as CEO last summer, replacing Dick Costolo, as the social media company tries to demonstrate its ability to expand its user base and develop new revenue streams.
I like Twitter. I find so many useful examples of SJW foolishness, pushback and meltdowns. And wit.
But I am no longer linking. I am taking screenshots. Because the links will develop rot.
Twitter has a bit of a ways to go before Google buys them. Somewhere below $5.