0/10 would send to Twitter jail
February 10, 2016 8:55 AM   Subscribe

This week, copyright trolls came for @Dog_rates, the beloved Twitter account that rates dogs (but NOT saber-toothed tigers or t-rexes). In a chilling move, the troll threatened to make a similar attack on @Dog_rates's biggest rival/colleague, @EverythingGoats. Twitter has refused to comment.
posted by a fiendish thingy (18 comments total) 9 users marked this as a favorite
 
I miss @horse_ebooks.
posted by Fizz at 8:58 AM on February 10, 2016 [3 favorites]


What a dumb time to be alive.
posted by boo_radley at 9:02 AM on February 10, 2016 [22 favorites]


Twitter Rolls Out Timeline Changes, Promises Easy Opt-Out Options

Basically nobody who runs Twitter has met anyone who uses Twitter and really they'd prefer Facebooks username instead anyway. Also their efforts to combat harassment remain in effective to useless.

Twitter, the company, fucking sucks basically. If what is good about Twitter the product and the set of community dynamics is to survive then some kind of escape boat is needed.
posted by Artw at 9:06 AM on February 10, 2016 [3 favorites]


what a weird feud

but seriously, WeRateDogs is the best twitter account
posted by entropone at 9:08 AM on February 10, 2016 [7 favorites]


You know how when you were a kid, you could get into an argument that would escalate to the point where the other kid punched you, and when you explained what had happened, both of you got punished and it all seemed so unfair?

But now that you're an adult, when a kid tries to explain an argument or altercation to you and your brain just tries to flee it like a rapidly overflowing toilet?

This felt a lot like that it. It's clear that there's some kind of chicanery and injustice here, but hell if I'm going to take the time to understand it.
posted by Navelgazer at 9:17 AM on February 10, 2016 [5 favorites]


Twitter Rolls Out Timeline Changes, Promises Easy Opt-Out Options

I was surprised to find that this is the "While you were gone..." thing they've been demoing in the Twitter app (or at least the beta version) since early last year and that I dismiss every time it pops up in my feed (and answer their "Did you like this?" popup with a "no," for all the good that did). Now that it's a full-fledged feature I can opt out!
posted by Holy Zarquon's Singing Fish at 9:19 AM on February 10, 2016


In a chilling move, the troll threatened to make a similar attack on ... @EverythingGoats

Someone tweet @kausmickey and see if he's behind this.
posted by octobersurprise at 9:19 AM on February 10, 2016


I was surprised to find that this is the "While you were gone..."

Oh I actually like that feature, I'm fine with seeing a few older tweets, but mostly I like it because its a useful visual marker of where in my timeline my session started rather than the practically invisible 'load more tweets' button (I tend to like to scroll down first and read back up in chronological order).
posted by TwoWordReview at 9:30 AM on February 10, 2016 [1 favorite]


Holy Zarquon (and anyone else for that matter), if you have uBlock Origin or AdBlock Plus (or anything that takes the same CSS syntax for element hiding), you can apply these things to improve your twitter experience:

! While you were away box
twitter.com##*[id^='stream-item-recap_entry-']
! Who to follow box
twitter.com##*[id^='stream-item-who_to_follow_entry-']
! Dumb 'interstitial' adbox
twitter.com###stream-items-id > .js-prompt-layout-container.js-stream-item.PromptbirdPrompt-streamItem > .js-prompt-layout-content > .PromptbirdPrompt--inline.PromptbirdPrompt
! the Moments tab
twitter.com###global-actions > .js-moments-tab.moments > .js-dynamic-tooltip.js-tooltip.js-nav[href="/i/moments"]
! remove people you block from search, mentions, damn near everything.
! cannot restrict to twitter.com, or it doesn't work on the search page
##div[data-you-block="true"]
posted by Xyanthilous P. Harrierstick at 9:32 AM on February 10, 2016 [8 favorites]


Reading this story, I can't shake the feeling that Myteenquote123 is actually a very sharp operator conducting a test to see whether Twitter will honor even incredibly amateurish DMCA takedown notices, as a prelude to something much nastier.
posted by adamrice at 9:32 AM on February 10, 2016


Once the tweets were deleted, Myteenquote123 sent a final email that said, "Enjoy your account. Sorry about that. I'm just a one of your old followers. I'm going through a tough time I'm really sorry."
Myteenquote123 may also be an actual teen.
posted by ignignokt at 9:39 AM on February 10, 2016 [4 favorites]


Metafilter: I'm going after the goats next. Please let them know.
posted by nathan_teske at 10:11 AM on February 10, 2016 [1 favorite]


Yeah, the whole thing sounded like it might be a terribly thought out joke. "I want your followers lol"

That said, I do appreciate that Twitter left up a note that said "Tweet missing for copyright infringement" in my timeline rather than completely disappearing @dog_rates without any notice.
posted by maryr at 10:11 AM on February 10, 2016


Several of my friends have been bigging up twtxt as a decentralized alternative to Twitter's heavy-handed cluelessness.
posted by scruss at 10:57 AM on February 10, 2016


It's clear that there's some kind of chicanery and injustice here, but hell if I'm going to take the time to understand it.

Fair enough, but it raised a lot of ire because of two things. One, @dog_rates is the bestest Twitter account. Two, it showed once again that Twitter doesn't care about harassment but does care about copyright, most likely because people with money care about copyright.
posted by sgranade at 1:15 PM on February 10, 2016 [4 favorites]


First they came for the dog-rating Twitter accounts, and I said nothing, for I did not rate dogs on Twitter.
posted by aaronetc at 5:41 PM on February 10, 2016


Better not be messing with ProBirdRights unless they are in league with the evil squirrels.
posted by fifteen schnitzengruben is my limit at 7:56 PM on February 10, 2016 [2 favorites]


A longer writeup from WaPo: "For Nelson and many of his fans, the whole ordeal has raised some serious questions about whether it’s simply too easy for pranksters to successfully remove content from the Internet by abusing the copyright claim process, particularly on Twitter."

The troll may have been a confused teen, but they went a long, long way to making this happen, including impersonating a New Zealand dairy farmer.
posted by a fiendish thingy at 12:27 PM on February 11, 2016


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