Comment by cryptoz | Hacker News Reader

Comment by cryptoz | Hacker News Reader

It doesn't matter, twitter. Delete the bots, ban the people making them, use ML to find out how they make so many and look so convincing to Americans, be transparent about how many people vs. bots you have. Or go home.

Right, you can't do any of that because then your shareholders would know about your hugely inflated growth numbers and your stock would collapse. I wonder, Twitter is so much worse for society than anyone ever knew, and they have been so quiet and complacent in the Russian takeover of the USA, that maybe they have acted illegally? Is it possible Twitter has been lying about bot account numbers and inflating their userbase counts to increase share value?

Okay, kick off the ads made by Russian enemies of the USA, that's a good move. But why did you allow it in the first place? Because of the money, and because nobody thought at Twitter than Russians buying political ads is a bad idea? The purchased ads weren't even the main issue - it's the millions and millions of bots echoing racist and hateful things to divide and wreck the US.

Fuck twitter.

This isn't enough. Apologize for the Russian takeover that you let happen. Don't donate that money to some cause about civic debates in the future. America is under attack right now. Give that money to someone who can stop the Russians because it's not you or your civic debates.

> Apologize for the Russian takeover that you let happen

if you compare the amount of money allegedly spent by "the russians" VS the amount of money spent by "the americans" themselves, talking about "the russian takeover" of Twitter or Facebook is pure hysteria.

Americans need to stop blaming the Russians for all their problems. Most Russians could not give a damn about US, most are way too busy making hands-meet right now.

The Russians didn't create or foster a divisive environment where everything is about insignificant petty differences. The Russians do not own CNN, ABC, MSNBC or Fox news who are making billions out of exploiting american divisions on every matter possible. The Russians didn't create that society of outrage and entertainment, the Russians didn't shape american society.

> if you compare the amount of money allegedly spent by "the russians" VS the amount of money spent by "the americans" themselves, talking about "the russian takeover" of Twitter or Facebook is pure hysteria.

The amount of money is a single metric and not what we should use to base every decision on or understand an entire complex issue from a single source (money). The Russian ads were very well crafted to be easily sharable and to be viral. The amount of money they spent has little to do with how much influence they have.

Your entire post is "whataboutism". What about the Americans being bad? What about CNN being bad? What about ABC being bad? What about most Russians just trying to make ends meet? What about MSNBC? What about Fox news?

I don't care.

The Russians are actively doing this on Twitter, right now. The others are bad too. That doesn't mean anything at all about this.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Whataboutism

Whataboutism, a classic Russian distraction tactic, by the way.

The Red Scare, a classic American delusion.

Are you suggesting that I'm delusional for seeing a threat in Russia's actions recently?

You are delusional if you focus on Russia as a threat. It's like all these talks about guns. Guns and Russia are the least of our problems.

What would be next? Google apologizing that you can find misinformation on the web? Paper apologizing for people writing on it?

> Google apologizing that you can find misinformation on the web?

Did Google run political ads that were purchased by other countries and intended to deceive the US electorate? If so then YES + a lot more than apologize.

> Paper apologizing for people writing on it?

There's no need for this. This is a major issue and I'm taking it very seriously. The "it's a joke bro" attitude here on HN, in your comment, all over reddit, Facebook, Twitter, etc., is sickening. It plays right into the Russian books - make the Americans argue about it and make jokes and make fun of the people who care!

> Did Google run political ads that were purchased by other countries and intended to deceive the US electorate?

Just from a quick search [1], yes. I don't think megous's comment has a "it's a joke bro" attitude. You're criticizing a company that provides a free service for taking the due diligence to prune its paying clients of anyone that they don't think should be a paying client. This has nothing to do with inflated growth numbers, it's about Twitter making the decision that they do not want state-funded Russian companies advertising on their platform. The bots issue is a completely different thing that I'm sure Twitter has an entire team of devs devoted to. It's not as easy as flipping a switch. They need to make sure they aren't banning real users of their service just because language and posting patterns used by those bots are based on those of real users.

[1] https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-switch/wp/2017/10/09...

This is called the "slippery slope fallacy".

http://www.nizkor.org/features/fallacies/slippery-slope.html

I don't think the slippery slope argument is a fallacy, it can be a genuine concern that is too easily written off as a "fallacy".

But what's next? All known fallacies becoming "genuine concerns"?

What I mean is that just writing off someone's concerns because it is a so-called fallacy instead of actually addressing their concern isn't ideal.

"This actually isn't a slippery slope because $REFUTATION" is better than "That's just a slippery slope fallacy".

There is a massive difference between stumbling onto fake news from a Google search and having it repeatedly presented to you without any action taken on your part.

>and look so convincing to Americans

Have you ever considered that those so-convincing bots aren't actually bots at all and might be so convincing because they're actual people? Always makes me chuckle how quick people are to call others machines or paid-actors because an unsavoury opinion is held.

No, I haven't, because there are teams, scientists, researchers, etc, that are slowly finding, identifying and proving botnets of accounts on Twitter.

I also use the term bot lightly, to include 'human being following orders' from a government or other organization.

> Always makes me chuckle how quick people are to call others machines or paid-actors because an unsavoury opinion is held.

WHAT? How dare you accuse me of this? "because an unsavoury opinion" what is this? That has nothing to do with this. I am accusing accounts of being bots because they are created automatically, they don't tweet normally like humans do, they follow clearly discernible patterns, etc. These bots are focused on sewing hatred and racism in the US.

I would never do what you are insinuating and it's insane that you think I would. Russians are using technology and paid actors to influence public opinion in the US. This is not based on some "unsavoury opinion" I didn't like in a tweet. This is the reality.

k

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