• @Painfinity@lemm.ee
    hexbear
    8
    5 months ago

    While I do believe that Twitter is slowly becoming a right-wing paradise due to its owner's say....... "tendencies".....AND has an interest to push its users towards that direction, I doubt the veracity of these pictures since it would mean that Twitter's algorithm would have gone completely bananas.

    While "trust me bro" sources often confirm what we all think, they often don't tell the whole story and have the sole purpose of going viral, especially on Twitter.

    Anyways, what's Twitter? Is that a knock-off Mastodon?

    • MiraculousMM [he/him, any]
      hexagon
      M
      hexbear
      26
      5 months ago

      it would mean that Twitter's algorithm would have gone completely bananas.

      Elon forced a ton of backend changes that have noticeably fucked with the site, one of the first thing he did when taking over was straight up removing ~80% of backend processes he deemed "useless" despite having zero knowledge of how the site actually works. Combine that with his regular boosting of chud conspiracy accounts and the proliferation of scam and porn advertisers on the site, and it doesn't seem out of the question at all for new Twitter users to get the shit in the OP pushed on them unprompted.

      • @Painfinity@lemm.ee
        hexbear
        11
        5 months ago

        Didn't know that first thing, sounds insane but can't say that I'm surprised🤣

        I might also add the repeated, and I do mean repeated, layoffs of Twitter employees that cut its work force to almost 1/4th of its original number.

        • Adkml [he/him]
          hexbear
          10
          edit-2
          5 months ago

          If it wouldn't surprise you why was your first instinct to call this false and defend Twitter with an argument like "that wouldnt make sense"?

          You see how your obsession with giving fascists the benefit of the doubt just helps them?

          • @Painfinity@lemm.ee
            hexbear
            5
            5 months ago

            Didn't know about that obsession of mine, thanks doc :P

            Seriously though, let me rephrase: What I meant with my comment is that I have as much trust in a Twitter user as I have in Twitter and Elon Musk, which is zero.

            So, when talking about Twitter, I trust what I can look up everywhere: I can look up that Twitter fired more than half of its workforce, and in addition I now know that Elon Musk likes to obsess about Twitter's code when he knows nothing about it and that he made changes to its code over and over again.

            As you can see, I am not giving Elon or Twitter the benefit of the doubt, I'm doing the exact opposite: If it's posted on Twitter, it's most likely false until proven otherwise. Wouldn't make sense to distrust the same person when they tell me something that I know is false, and trust them when they tell me something that I like, would it?😂

            If you're talking about "arguments", there's enough shit that happens around Twitter, using the dubious screenshots of a Twitter user as arguments just weakens everything else. This is just a "sad if true" and a great conversation starter for us. I wanted to take a jab at the possible truthfulness of those screenshots, learned about the fact that Elon did in fact, in its infinite wisdom, change considerable part of Twitter's backend and could have fucked up the algorithm, and thus am quite convinced that not even new Twitter users are safe now. At this point I even pity the Twitter bots.

            Anyways, carry on :)

    • axont [she/her, comrade/them]
      hexbear
      7
      5 months ago

      It wouldn't surprise me if the recommendation algorithm is based on Musk's personal account or something. He wants to be the most important person on Twitter.

    • GarbageShoot [he/him]
      hexbear
      6
      5 months ago

      It could be operating off of cookies or something. Let me tell you, I've looked at incognito Youtube many times (to bypass a sitewide block I myself put on because I'm stupid) and it has a lot of ViRAl stuff, but also a really clear right slant. This probably wasn't the only stuff the friend saw, but I'd be very willing to believe that it was like a fifth along with more innocuous viral-marketing bullshit. Sooner a thousand Shapiros than a single account left of Nancy Pelosi.