Censorship: Twitter Takeover Totally Panics Political Regime of LeftLibDemSocMediaTechPol

grarpamp grarpamp at gmail.com
Mon Dec 19 17:42:00 PST 2022


Contents

    1 Background section
    2 NPOV template
    3 Content > Planned releases on other topics
    4 Replacing "troll-like behaviors" with "tweets which detract"
    5 Sorting out a weird problem with posts getting miscounted and
deleted with other edits
    6 Fourth release, this time by Shellenberger
    7 The Economist/Guardian misleading snippet "on Twitter's
right-wing bias contradicting Weiss"

Background section

User:Soibangla: don't know how strongly you felt this change was
needed; there's two conflicting needs, one is to offer comprehensive
background and context, and the other is to avoid the background
section becoming a huge part of the article. I think that tipped us
over that line; is there anything else you think should be kept beyond
the Sussman stuff? DFlhb (talk) 01:21, 9 December 2022 (UTC)[reply]

    I think it's important to briefly show the long history of the
alleged FBI/Clinton/DNC "Russia hoax" that Trump has promoted into
2022, with a lawsuit, which he and his supporters have characterized
as the "real collusion," and which now dovetails into the current
narrative of FBI/Twitter/Biden collusion as part of a supposed
sweeping deep state operation. This now includes the involvement of
Baker, upon Musk's discovery that Baker was involved and worked for
the FBI in 2016 and had a witness role in the Sussmann case that
conspiracy theorists were confident would blow the "real collusion"
wide open. Twitter Files didn't suddenly come out of nowhere, it had a
long deep state narrative that preceded it, and that narrative is not
supported by the many reliable sources across other Wikipedia
articles. I don't see it's "a huge part of the article," as there's
still the Bari Weiss stuff coming, and presumably much more analysis
and reactions. soibangla (talk) 01:54, 9 December 2022 (UTC)[reply]
    @DFlhb: I tend to agree with you. Excessive “background” that is
ostensibly added to put things into perspective can quickly appear
like proselytizing with bias. Greg L (talk) 03:03, 9 December 2022
(UTC)[reply]

        "Appear" to whom? Those with their own bias? Is the content
inadequately sourced? Is it inaccurate, misleading or defective in a
way that can be specified? Can it be tweaked rather than chucked?
soibangla (talk) 03:16, 9 December 2022 (UTC) soibangla (talk) 05:06,
9 December 2022 (UTC)[reply]

    What in the world is that diff? Was someone editing the wrong page
by mistake? I do not see any reason to include a paragraph of random
stuff about QAnon in this article -- is the reasoning that it's about
American politics, so it's relevant to Twitter, because Americans post
about politics there?? jp×g 05:47, 9 December 2022 (UTC)[reply]

        a paragraph of random stuff about QAnon? um...no? soibangla
(talk) 06:04, 9 December 2022 (UTC)[reply]
        Yeah; the main problem with it is that the link to QAnon and
the "deep state" is tenuous, and attempts to frame it as a marginal
narrative, when it's very pervasive among even mainstream
conservatives.
        Conservatives mainly believe that the government is involved
because of these three things:

            the Zuckerberg FBI warning, which conservatives saw as the
FBI deliberately trying to suppress the story; keep in mind that the
FBI had the laptop for a year at that point, and therefore knew its
contents.
            the 51 intel officers that attempted to frame it as
Russian disinformation, and were echoed by the Biden campaign; which
Vox later said was never backed by evidence (one could uncharitably
say, discredited); conservatives perceived this as an attempt to
control the narrative
            the year-old news about the DHS disinfo board (which
conservatives saw as aptly-named), and more recent revelations about
it, which went utterly viral in conservative social media & television
circles

        I concede the above is OR, but I doubt the majority of editors
are as familiar as me with conservative thinking — I monitor that
space very closely. It would be good (and far more relevant) to
include the above in the Background section, as long as it can be
reliably sourced without OR or SYNTH, as a way to explain the
"government involvement" claims; which can then be described as
baseless where appropriate. DFlhb (talk) 06:39, 9 December 2022
(UTC)[reply]

            "the link to QAnon and the "deep state" is tenuous" but
the reliable source [1] discusses it a bit, yet I did not use that as
the preface of my paragraph, but only briefly at the close of the
paragraph; it is not "a paragraph of random stuff about QAnon",
discussion of QAnon comes late in the story, and that's how I treated
it. Nevertheless, major QAnon influencer Liz Crokin was at MAL this
week, where Trump "heaped praise on...Michael Flynn—who has become one
of the most high-profile QAnon influencers in recent years," who was
also at MAL this week. The paragraph does not contain "attempts to
frame it as a marginal narrative", though a perusal of our various
relevant articles show that it is, in fact, a marginal narrative, but
that's not suggested in this paragraph. The key, but not only, reason
the paragraph should be included is:

                Fans of Trump suspected there was more to Twitter’s
actions. They believed the FBI and the Democratic National Committee,
which they believed colluded to rig the 2016 election with allegations
of the Trump campaign’s alleged ties to Russia, were meddling in the
2020 vote as well: the Deep State in action.

            For convenience, here's the paragraph in question:

                The Russian government exploited social media
extensively as part of its interference in the 2016 presidential
election to boost Trump's candidacy. Since that election that Trump
won, he and many of his supporters promoted a narrative that the FBI,
Hillary Clinton, the Democratic National Committee and others colluded
to fabricate allegations of Trump collusion with Russia, so as to
prevent his election and damage his presidency. This narrative
extended into the 2020 election season, after Twitter withheld
distribution of the story on the Hunter Biden laptop, characterizing
it as a deep state operation that now included social media and the
Biden campaign, to defeat Trump. The narrative was boosted by news
during the Twitter Files release that Musk had fired deputy general
counsel James Baker for his involvement in the decision to withhold
the laptop story and later vetting documents for the Twitter Files
project. Baker had previously been general counsel for the FBI when he
was a witness for, but not implicated in, the failed John Durham
prosecution of Michael Sussmann on allegations he worked with the 2016
Clinton campaign to advance a Russian collusion narrative against
Trump. The deep state narrative was promoted by influencers in the
QAnon conspiracy theory.

            Maybe take another read of the Wired story? soibangla
(talk) 14:59, 9 December 2022 (UTC)[reply]

I’m surprised soibangla didn’t seek a lower profile after nominating
this article for deletion only one hour after it was created. The
nomination was WP:Snowballed because the nomination was wildly
contrary the sensibilities and general consensus of the wikipedian
community.

The background information that soibangla added amounts to
editorializing and is a bit too tangential for this article. It
therefore isn’t sufficiently encyclopedic. Wikipedia is a
general-interest encyclopedia and isn’t a venue to use to slant or
bias the reader so they interpret properly cited facts in a preferred
or desired context. We have ample hyperlinks in the article if the
reader wants to follow up on a related topic.

This article, more so than nearly any other, is right now under the
general public’s microscope precisely because of soibangla's
nomination for deletion received national headlines. We need to adhere
particularly closely to Wikipedia's values and rules and push back on
partisanship. This article is about the “Twitter files” and we follow
what the WP:RSs are writing about after each release from Musk. If
soibangla wants to editorialize and “put things in context,” he/she
can go on Twitter and extol the important background information and
history lessons there. Greg L (talk) 14:43, 9 December 2022
(UTC)[reply]

    Or perhaps you might go on Twitter or some dumb podcast[2] to take
shots at me. soibangla (talk) 15:08, 9 December 2022 (UTC)[reply]
    Greg L, I'm happy to consider any responses you might provide to
the specific questions I previously posed to you:

        Is the content inadequately sourced? Is it inaccurate,
misleading or defective in a way that can be specified? Can it be
tweaked rather than chucked?

    soibangla (talk) 16:54, 9 December 2022 (UTC)[reply]

        I wholeheartedly agree with Greg L. soibangla is basically
ubiquitously trying to shape the wiki in an "opinionated" way, his (or
hers). Recusing oneself would have been maybe more cautious,
especially since his/her emotionality exudes from the comments in all
his/her comments in the talk section.

            These comments are not appropriate for this Talk page.
Bring it to my Talk page and maybe I'll discuss it. Or maybe not.
soibangla (talk) 19:11, 9 December 2022 (UTC)[reply]

                    Oh, come on, Soibangla. Do you really expect
people to bring things to your talk page if you immediately delete
them, like you did here with me? And that was accompanied by this edit
summary: "HAHAHA". You did the very same thing recently to JPxG here,
where you didn’t respond in a collegial and responsive manner and
instead just ignored it by reverting. Given that tendency of yours,
which can come across as insular and resistant to peer pressure,
people will instead attempt to hash things out where the sunshine of
an open forum sanitizes the behavior of editors a bit so we can have a
proper collaborative writing environment.
                    It’s not too much to ask that you listen to
others’ comments and respond productively and in a collegial fashion.
Greg L (talk) 19:07, 12 December 2022 (UTC)[reply]

                Seems a convenient way to deny/ignore your own,
evident bias in the topic. There remains the fact that no good will
come from a factious editing and trying your best to bludgeon other
users' edits with your imposed view of the currently unveiling story.
— Preceding unsigned comment added by 37.160.155.143 (talk) 01:26, 10
December 2022 (UTC)[reply]

NPOV template

Iamahumanborninearth (talk · contribs) has added an NPOV template to
the article, but has not initiated any talk page discussion, outlining
their objections, as required by WP:NPOV dispute#Adding a tag to a
page. Anyone want to weigh-in? Esowteric + Talk + Breadcrumbs 11:58,
10 December 2022 (UTC)[reply]

    Removed in this edit. Iamahumanborninearth or anyone else needs to
raise specific objections on this talk page when placing that tag.
--MZMcBride (talk) 18:03, 10 December 2022 (UTC)[reply]

        The Twitter Files page is based on the claims made by three
journalists (Matt Taibbi, Bari Weiss, and Michael Shellenberger) and
the related information provided so far via Twitter with allegedly
more installments and material still promised to be made public. These
journalists have made several claims which have to be reported on the
Twitter Files page. That’s the whole purpose of having a “Twitter
Files” page in the first place. Denying the integration of the
asserted and documented claims done by the authors is a POV neutrality
infringement, biasing the whole purpose of the page. I’ve respectfully
pointed this out several times to no avail, so I’m raising the issue
again - it’s not about defining whether the claims/allegations are
true yet. It’s about stating facts as reported by the journalists that
launched the coverage and are reporting on the “Twitter Files”. Saying
that, e.g., Matt Taibbi claimed that (quoting here) “[...] the Slack
entries in Part 3 contain multiple, clear displays of cooperation
between Twitter and federal law enforcement and/or intelligence [...]"
is simply describing that these are his unequivocal and undisputed
words (he wrote them, so by definition, we can (I'd say we ought to)
report that he wrote them!) and is in no way misleading or fake news.
What is also true is that we would still not be claiming that what he
wrote has been universally verified or accepted by anyone. These are 2
different aspects that must be distinguished. Some editors seem
incapable of recognizing the issue, and very keen only on focusing on
the latter, then dabbling in quibbling the most extravagant of cavils
in WPs policies to avoid confronting the issue - this, in my humble
opinion, harms the neutrality of the article at its core and that's
why I'm raising this as a WP:NPOV violation.— Preceding unsigned
comment added by 37.163.249.30 (talk)

Content > Planned releases on other topics

This section is supposed to be about the content of the disclosures,
isn't it? Yet with the official tweet deleted, all we are left with
is: "On December 10, 2022 Musk threatened to sue any Twitter employee
who leaked information to the press. This was expressed in an
all-hands email to Twitter employees with employees being given a
pledge to sign indicating that they understood him.[refs]"

And this is surely only relevant here if we can word a hook to hang it
on; if we can make the angle explicit. Esowteric + Talk + Breadcrumbs
19:05, 11 December 2022 (UTC)[reply]

    We can change the section title, dropping planned would do it.
Unfortunately WP:BLP required us to remove the tweet, kind of shocked
at the lack of competence of whoever added it in the first place.
Horse Eye's Back (talk) 19:36, 11 December 2022 (UTC)[reply]

        Yes, that's bad. Primary sources can be used only for
uncontroversial and simple statements of fact, not BLP stuff. (Also
ABOUTSELF in the author's own bio.) IOW, not Twitter, Taibbi, or Musk.
All those things can and (often) should be added using secondary RS
that show us the due weight to give that content. -- Valjean (talk)
(PING me) 19:45, 11 December 2022 (UTC)[reply]

            Very true, the tweet is from today so we should not have
to wait long for secondary coverage. Horse Eye's Back (talk) 19:50, 11
December 2022 (UTC)[reply]

                Then we can quote it using the secondary RS as the
source. That's how we can still fulfill our purpose to document the
"sum of all human knowledge," including fringe nonsense and stuff that
might otherwise violate BLP. -- Valjean (talk) (PING me) 19:55, 11
December 2022 (UTC)[reply]

        As it stands, there is no link to the content of the
disclosures. The statement is in limbo. We really need an RS that says
something along the lines of "here we have Musk maintaining one thing
and yet here he is doing something else. And no, we can't make that
link ourselves. Esowteric + Talk + Breadcrumbs 20:01, 11 December 2022
(UTC)[reply]

            Have you not read the sources? Horse Eye's Back (talk)
20:03, 11 December 2022 (UTC)[reply]

                You can't just rely on what you or other people may
have seen in, and deduced from, the sources: you have to actually use
that content in the wiki article (which should stand on its own
merits), explicitly making the link. You may know it's hypocritical; I
may know: but this entry does not make that clear. And that is surely
the reason for including this information. Esowteric + Talk +
Breadcrumbs 21:31, 11 December 2022 (UTC)[reply]

                    Agreed. I think your point is spot on, Esowteric.
Greg L (talk) 22:18, 11 December 2022 (UTC)[reply]
                    What is your proposed text? Horse Eye's Back
(talk) 22:40, 11 December 2022 (UTC)[reply]

                        I've amended the wording (just a draft
proposal), as follows: "On December 10, 2022 Musk threatened to sue
any Twitter employee who leaked information to the press, despite his
claims to be a "free speech absolutist" who believes that
"transparency is the key to trust", and having himself released
internal emails to selected journalists.[refs] This threat was
expressed in an all-hands email to Twitter employees with employees
being given a pledge to sign indicating that they understood
him.[refs]" Esowteric + Talk + Breadcrumbs 09:16, 12 December 2022
(UTC)[reply]

                            No. This is a pretty blatant attempt to
use RS to lead a reader by the nose to a particular
conclusion.Slywriter (talk) 12:58, 12 December 2022 (UTC)[reply]

                                Care to suggest an improvement? I
think that Esowteric does a pretty good job, but of course there's
almost always room for improvement. Horse Eye's Back (talk) 15:56, 12
December 2022 (UTC)[reply]

                                    Yes, drop the quotes and report
the facts of what happened in the email without reference to other
events/statements. If the quotes are WP:DUE, cover them separately. As
it stands despite, believes and having releases are all weasel
statements that tell the reader how to feel about his email to
workers, which is standard run of the mill corporate policySlywriter
(talk) 16:01, 12 December 2022 (UTC)[reply]

                                        I don't see how WP:NPOV lets
us do that, we can't violate neutrality that egregiously. Horse Eye's
Back (talk) 16:08, 12 December 2022 (UTC)[reply]

                                            I can't access the first
source but Independent reads like an opinion piece, not a news
article. And separating out the statements does not violate NPOV
unless the statement is going to be attributed to the reporter writing
it, so that it's clear it's their opinion of the matter and not
wikivoice. Slywriter (talk) 16:17, 12 December 2022 (UTC)[reply]

                                                The Independent's
title makes the link / hypocrisy quite clearly: "Free speech warrior
Elon Musk reportedly threatens to sue Twitter staff if they leak to
media". "who believes that "transparency is the key to trust" has
already been removed. Esowteric + Talk + Breadcrumbs 16:23, 12
December 2022 (UTC)[reply]

                                                    While the headline
does say that, I would point out WP:HEADLINE. That a piece's headline
(or subhead) is extremely pointy is not relevant to how we ought write
articles; the guideline correctly notes that headlines are often
overstated or lack context, and sometimes contain exaggerations or
sensationalized claims with the intention of attracting readers to an
otherwise reliable article. In general, headlines are not the sort of
thing we should be citing. — Red-tailed hawk (nest) 20:03, 12 December
2022 (UTC)[reply]

                                                        I merely
quoted the headline and subheading here to show the story's
overarching angle. I also quoted from the text Esowteric + Talk +
Breadcrumbs 20:06, 12 December 2022 (UTC)[reply]
                                                        And given that
the angle of the story was something like "do as I say, not do as I
do", my use of the structure "... despite ..." seems fair. Esowteric +
Talk + Breadcrumbs 20:23, 12 December 2022 (UTC)[reply]

                                                Subtitle: "World’s
wealthiest person suggests staff could face ‘full extent of the law’
for leaking to press after he gave access to internal messages and
emails to select media". Esowteric + Talk + Breadcrumbs 16:27, 12
December 2022 (UTC)[reply]
                                                The piece does not
appear to be marked opinion, its a news article unless you can present
a WP:RS which says it isn't. You can't make your own rules. Horse
Eye's Back (talk) 16:29, 12 December 2022 (UTC)[reply]
                                                Text: "The new owner
of the social media company – who has repeatedly endorsed free speech
absolutism and asserted “transparency is the key to trust” and that
“sunlight is the best disinfectant” – has ordered staff to sign a
document acknowledging the warning, according to reporting from
Platformer managing editor Zoe Schiffer." Esowteric + Talk +
Breadcrumbs 16:34, 12 December 2022 (UTC)[reply]
                                                Last I checked, we can
evaluate a source on a talk page and question whether the source can
be used in wiki-voice to make statements of fact. So kindly, do not
attempt to gatekeep opinions you disagree with by inventing rules of
discussion or implying I have created some rule. The source looks like
an opinion piece and reads like an opinion piece. Others can disagree
and life will go on, but saying that violates no rule of wikipedia
Slywriter (talk) 16:40, 12 December 2022 (UTC)[reply]

                                                    We have a
community consensus that they're generally reliable. There are two
ways forward for you: either you provide a WP:RS which says that this
is an opinion piece or you challenge the reliability of The
Independent at WP:RSN. Horse Eye's Back (talk) 16:44, 12 December 2022
(UTC)[reply]
                                                    I've generally
trusted The Independent over the last 30-or-so years. It was a
respectable national newspaper in the UK and has since gone
digital-only. This piece looks like basic reporting to me, with a
catchy story angle along the lines of "do as I say, not do as I do."
Esowteric + Talk + Breadcrumbs 16:56, 12 December 2022 (UTC)[reply]

                                                        Hi, Esowteric.
Though some editors advise caution when citing the online version (and
that would especially be the case on Twitter-related issues at the
moment), The Independent is considered to be an RS for use on
Wikpedia. Like all RSs, The Independent, provides a secondary,
reliable source to establish relevance and filter the meaning of a
primary source. And it’s always helpful when the cited article
provides a hyperlink to the primary source (which could be a Tweet) or
an image of it so there is no mistaking the subject matter being
covered. Greg L (talk) 19:32, 12 December 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Hi Red-tailed hawk. I removed the article-wide {{POV}} tag, but please
feel free to add a {{POV section}} tag if you feel it's still
warranted. I couldn't quite follow this discussion except to say that
I don't think there's an active dispute about the neutrality of the
article overall, just maybe a specific paragraph or section.
--MZMcBride (talk) 23:13, 12 December 2022 (UTC)[reply]
Replacing "troll-like behaviors" with "tweets which detract"

Soibangla

The problem is "troll-like behaviors" is neither a direct quote from
the Business insider article, nor the Forbes article. It could be
replaced with a paraphrase, but it needs to reflect the source used.
Insider references tweets, not accounts. Forbes doesn't directly
reference the 2018 policy. I believe the language of my edit better
represents the source used, although it would be an improvement to
replace it with a better source.

Here is the actual text from Business Insider:

"Twitter first announced in 2018 it would effectively hide some tweets
from conversations and search results, according to The Washington
Post's Will Oremus. Twitter at the time said it would look at the way
other individuals reacted to an account in order to avoid showing
tweets that "detract" from conversations." Amthisguy (talk) 23:14, 12
December 2022 (UTC)[reply]

    I agree. Assuming the facts that “troll-like behaviors” wasn’t
text by the cited RS, it treads a bit too far into editorializing.
Greg L (talk) 23:17, 12 December 2022 (UTC)[reply]
    Well here's what they said:

        What we’re talking about today are troll-like behaviors that
distort and detract from the public conversation on Twitter,
particularly in communal areas like conversations and search. Some of
these accounts and Tweets violate our policies, and, in those cases,
we take action on them. Others don’t but are behaving in ways that
distort the conversation.

    [3] soibangla (talk) 23:24, 12 December 2022 (UTC)[reply]

        Thank you, Soibangla. The primary source uses “troll-like
behavior”, so it seems fine by me. As long as the secondary RS is
discussing that particular part of the original Tweet, and the author
of the secondary RS is addressing the meaning of that particular
paragraph (the one containing “troll-like behavior”) so the quote
isn’t being taken out of the intended context, I don’t see anything
wrong with quoting the primary source. I don’t think I fully
understand Amthisguy’s concern. Greg L (talk) 23:50, 12 December 2022
(UTC)[reply]

            The issue was the article lacked an in-line citation to
the source of the quote. I'll add it, along with the other half of my
edit which hasn't been objected to. Thank you. Amthisguy (talk) 00:07,
13 December 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Sorting out a weird problem with posts getting miscounted and deleted
with other edits

Hello everyone.

The wiki engine appears to be having trouble with new sections
accidentally deleting previous ones. I suspect the various servers are
struggling to stay in sync. Try modifying this section (and rename it)
instead of clicking the “New section” tab.

Greg L (talk) 01:45, 11 December 2022 (UTC)[reply]

    I think I know why this is happening, and it's due to how "edit
section" links work. The URL I'm typing stuff into right now is
Talk:Twitter_Files&action=edit&section=56, i.e. this is the 56th
section on the talk page. Normally, if someone edits a page while I'm
editing it, I will get an edit conflict when I save -- but this
doesn't happen with section edits. That is, I can edit section 56, and
in the meantime, someone else can edit section 30... and if their edit
adds a new section, then 31 will become 32, 32 will become 33, etc --
and section 55 will become section 56. So when I send the server my
edit to "section 56" it will just nuke whatever was there. I don't
know if there is a way to overcome this. jp×g 01:56, 11 December 2022
(UTC)[reply]

        It may have been my use of a horizontal rule {{hr}} inside my
post. That might be fouling up section counts. I fixed that this time.
Greg L (talk) 02:08, 11 December 2022 (UTC)[reply]

            But Soibangla purposely deleted my whole post just moments
ago, with an edit statement of “What part of WP:NOTFORUM eludes you?”
I asked him on his talk page not to do that again. He deleted that
request, which is his right. The concept of

“ 	The best response to bad speech is better speech 	”

            …must not have registered.
            And I see he deleted my post earlier too, accompanied by
an edit summary that read “…right-wing blowhard glad-handing and
congratulating himself…”. At least he didn’t call me a Nazi, so
Godwin's law hasn’t yet applied.
            Looking over the history on this talk page, it appears
that Soibangla has had a long and exceedingly bold history of
unilaterally taking it upon himself to decide what he will permit to
be discussed here. I think we need to keep an eye on that sort of
behavior. The hotter the topic, the more we need vigorous debate, not
censorship and hiding entire discussion threads behind WP:NOTFORUM
curtains.
            If my below “thank you” to the community offends
Soibangla’s sensibilities, he can have an admin delete it or (better
yet) respond with a thoughtful post of his own that informs. I
received two “thank yous” in response to it, so it seems to be a 2:1
consensus in favor of my post here not being banned from this talk
page (irony intentional). Greg L (talk) 04:03, 11 December 2022
(UTC)[reply]

Oh, Soibangla, please desist with using WP:NOTFORUM as a pretense for
deleting others’ posts like this. That policy is obviously intended to
apply to WP:ARTICLESPACE. The whole point of talk pages is to express
views and great leeway is afforded to posts on talk pages, including
political and editorial policy views that might “trigger.”

Wikipedia has a long history on its talk pages of having I.P. editors
weigh in with some left-field suggestion and the proper practice is to
just read them and move on; they eventually get archived along with
everything else. You know this, don’t you?

If you disagree with another editor’s sentiments, try writing
something cogent, illuminating, and thoughtful in response. If post is
a personal attack, take them to ANI. And if you see a post that
expresses a view that triggers you, just suck it up. Greg L (talk)
04:23, 11 December 2022 (UTC)[reply]

        I also found your cringe-inducing pontificating on irrelevant
matters embarrassing and grossly inappropriate and have deleted it,
per policy. Please save such stuff for forums, or better yet, your
diary. 174.197.133.171 (talk) 04:29, 11 December 2022 (UTC)[reply]

PS: the fact that you state “Notforum is clearly meant to be about
article space” indicates you may be fundamentally unfamiliar with
policy. Look at the top of this page, where is posted NOTFORUM. Not
forum is specifically meant to outlaw posts such as yours where
editors just discuss their thoughts on the topic rather than how to
improve the article, as if anyone cares about your feelings or
ill-considered political views. No one cares. 174.197.133.171 (talk)
04:42, 11 December 2022 (UTC)[reply]

    You aren’t fooling anyone by logging out and editing as an I.P. on
the precise same topic that triggered you. If you delete my posts
another time, Soibangla, the only proper recourse will be to report
you to ANI. This is a friendly warning. Greg L (talk) 04:54, 11
December 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Fourth release, this time by Shellenberger

American author Michael Shellenberger releases 'Twitter Files Part 4'[1]

Valjean (talk) (PING me) 16:51, 12 December 2022 (UTC)[reply]

    And, we've got part 5 now as well. — Red-tailed hawk (nest) 19:58,
12 December 2022 (UTC)[reply]

        Thank you, Red-tailed hawk. I’ve worked separately with three
Chinese mechanical engineers over the years and I understand their
worldview. That just-released internal email had an impact on me and I
hope the following quote from the article makes it way into our
Twitter Files article: "Maybe because I am from China, [but] I deeply
understand how censorship can destroy the public conversation."
        Maybe The Twitter Files will one-day provoke Congress to build
upon Marsh v. Alabama, which held that trespassing laws "could not be
used to prevent the distribution of religious materials on a town's
sidewalk even though the sidewalk was part of a privately-owned
company town." Key point here regarding editorial content of this
article: I hope other wikipedians here will be on the lookout for
Marsh v. Alabama and related statutes and case law being discussed by
RSs in connection with The Twitter Files. Anytime the privately owned
equivalent of a public square begins internally asking “Should this
sort of topic be permitted to be discussed?? Let’s go ask the CEO,”
we’re—as the Chinese employee wrote—at risk of destroying the public
conversation. Greg L (talk) 20:46, 12 December 2022 (UTC)[reply]

            Are there sources that connect Marsh v. Alabama to this? —
Red-tailed hawk (nest) 21:47, 12 December 2022 (UTC)[reply]

                There remains intense interest in this article (click
“Logarithmic scale” under “U.S. Senate”), so I hope other wikipedians
here will be on the lookout for Marsh v. Alabama and related statutes
and case law being discussed by RSs in connection with The Twitter
Files. If the RSs discuss it, we may. I haven’t dug for any but seem
to recall that recently a member of congress mentioned that Congress
should consider laws governing censorship on privately owned
public-discussion venues. As I recall, the musings of that congressman
was in response to Twitter. Of course this article isn’t about Twitter
in general; it is specifically about The Twitter Files, which is
Musk-released documents regarding past Twitter censorship.
Accordingly, it’s not a stretch to anticipate than an RS would cover
the legal regulation of privately owned public-discussion venues (à la
Marsh v. Alabama, but it wouldn’t be that particular Supreme Court
decision as that is established legal precedent) in an article on The
Twitter Files. Greg L (talk) 22:53, 12 December 2022 (UTC)[reply]

                    Trespassing laws are criminal laws enforced by the
government - ergo their enforcement falls under the First Amendment.
Twitter banning an account involves no government action, therefore
does not implicate the First Amendment. NorthBySouthBaranof (talk)
01:15, 13 December 2022 (UTC)[reply]

                        Well… shucks, counselor. Matters of law are
complex and I’m certainly no Constitutional scholar (though I might
play one on Wikipedia, along with a thousand others). I do, however,
know that other Supreme Court rulings like Pruneyard Shopping Center
v. Robins further buttress the principle that there are limits to the
extent private businesses may limit speech rights. That was a case
about high school students who were trying to solicit signatures for a
petition at a mall. Now, in that case, the Supreme Court held that a
state constitution (California’s) afforded free speech rights beyond
those of the U.S. Constitution.
                        My point with mentioning Marsh v. Alabama
wasn’t that it was specifically governing with regard to Twitter, but
to illuminate the broad concept that with true 18th-century public
town squares and other “public forums” long replaced by 20th-century
(privately owned) malls, and those now replaced by 21st-century
digital town squares (also privately owned) the extent to which
private enterprise may decide who may hand out pamphlets on their
property and what sort of messages they will permit can most certainly
be limited by statute. That’s all.
                        Thus, it didn’t surprise me in the least that
a U.S. congressman would be talking about legislation along these
lines. So I propose we doff our Wikipedia-grade powdered wigs and just
keep an eye peeled for how Congress deals with this issue
and—especially—keep an eye peeled for what the RS’s cover on that
topic. Greg L (talk) 04:56, 13 December 2022 (UTC)[reply]

                            "the extent to which private enterprise
may decide who may hand out pamphlets on their property and what sort
of messages they will permit can most certainly be limited by statute"
- that's a speculative opinion at best, and I don't think this line of
speculation is helpful here. Might as well speculate that Tesla's
tanking stock will soon force Elon to sell Twitter to the Saudis.
NorthBySouthBaranof (talk) 06:52, 13 December 2022 (UTC)[reply]

                                Not at all speculative,
NorthBySouthBaranof; just insufficiently cited, which apparently
resulted in failure to overcome skepticism. I was going off memory.
Per Reuters – U.S. Senator thinks Twitter and Facebook may need a
license to operate, twas U.S. Senator Lindsay Graham. And, our very
own article: Pruneyard Shopping Center v. Robins – Relevance to cases
involving online forums, very handily connects the dots from A) what I
wrote above and B) to what you just declared was purely “speculative”.

                                It took me only 20 seconds to locate
the Reuters article to find out which lawmaker it was, and only 30
more seconds to find Wikipedia’s very own article specifically
connecting Pruneyard Shopping Center v. Robins to Twitter. You could
have done the same, NorthBySouthBaranof, before declaring what you
think isn’t “helpful here.” Not that you don’t have a right to express
your opinion. Thanks for that.

                                Now let me make myself clear: I agree
with you; both Marsh v. Alabama and Pruneyard Shopping Center v.
Robins established that there is no 1st Amendment “U.S.
Constitutional” right at the federal level requiring that those with
political speech must be accommodated on private property when the
speakers and/or messages are contrary to the wishes of the property
owner who has Great Wisdom©™® to know what speech is “helpful here,”
as you put it, and what speech people need protection from and can’t
be allowed to hear.

                                It’s equally noteworthy that Pruneyard
Shopping Center v. Robins established that many state constitutions,
including California’s, do give their residents a constitutional right
to free speech on private property that serves as a public forum;
which is to say, private venues equivalent to a town square. And, of
course, as Senator Graham is intent upon, legislation can fill in the
gaps not expressly enumerated in the U.S. Constitution.

                                I think you missed both my broad point
about what lawmakers are contemplating, why they are contemplating it,
and how that relates to Twitter Files. Senator Graham took his stance
before Musk made his first release of The Twitter Files. Now that
evidence is coming out in droves demonstrating what Graham and most
other Republicans and Republican lawmakers long suspected, this issue
of political speech over privately owned “public forums” will
undoubtedly become much more topical as it relates to this article.

                                Accordingly we wikipedians should A)
understand the relevancy of “political speech on privately owned
public forums”; specifically as it relates to Twitter and The Twitter
Files, and B) be on the lookout for articles discussing both.

                                So, as I wrote in my previous post
(and taking a cue from the waitress “practicing politics” in Billy
Joel’s The Piano Man), I propose we doff our Wikipedia-grade powdered
wigs, just deliver the drinks to tables, and watch what Senator Graham
and other lawmakers do because legislation based on these principles
of free speech is being discussed. Greg L (talk) 19:34, 13 December
2022 (UTC)[reply]

References

    Folmar, Chloe (December 10, 2022). "American author Michael
Shellenberger releases 'Twitter Files Part 4'". The Hill. Retrieved
December 12, 2022.

The Economist/Guardian misleading snippet "on Twitter's right-wing
bias contradicting Weiss"

Claim: "Twitter reported in 2021 that there was "statistically
significant difference favoring the political right wing" in every
country except Germany, which is in contradiction to Weiss' claims of
left-wing bias."


Sources

The Guardian - source [4]

The Economist - source [5]

Upon reading the sources it's clear that this is a completely "straw
claim" since it refers to an unexplained right-wing bias related to
the Twitter algorithm and obviously does not refer to the human bias
around which the Twitter Files released information is built on.


The Guardian

- "... Twitter said it wasn’t clear why its Home timeline produced
these results and indicated that it may now need to change its
algorithm ...

- The post acknowledged that it was concerning if certain tweets
received preferential treatment not as a result of the way in which
users interacted, but because of the inbuilt way the algorithm works.

- "...Further root cause analysis is required in order to determine
what, if any, changes are required to reduce adverse impacts by our
Home timeline algorithm,” the post said"


The Economist

- The algorithm did give extra amplification to news sources that
independent groups like Ad Fontes Media classify as conservative.

- Twitter's algorithm gave most of these sites extra exposure"


Not only the snippet doesn't belong to the page (unwanted algorithmic
vs deliberate human bias) but the way it is reported is misleading
with respect to the sources' contents reported. Please notice, in
fact, that The Economist article makes it clear that this "exposure
boost" must be intended as a variation (or rate of change) of the
exposure provided and that must be intended on average and not for all
conservative media/newspapers (→ this picture extracted from The
Economist article shows is quite clearly → [6])


Moreover, in fact, the Economist article significantly adds that:

→ "The New York Times and the Wall Street Journal (still) appeared
most often, whereas more partisan sources like the Nation or the Daily
Wire received less exposure"

→ "Right-leaning sources on the right did get larger boosts on
average, but the difference was small".

→ "Factual accuracy was a much better predictor of the algorithm's
behavior. After combining reliability scores for each site from
several independent sources, we found that the algorithm gave the
biggest boosts to the least accurate sites, regardless of their
politics"

→ "Left-wing sites with poor accuracy scores, like tmz, were amplified
more than credible, conservative ones like the Wall Street Journal"


Conclusion: what is portrayed by the articles, especially the
Economist, is more complex and can't be included as a trivial report
to simply contradict what Weiss is claiming to be a human bias (and
not a minor & unwanted algorithm bias). Doesn't belong to this article
page. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 77.32.8.179 (talk) 00:22,
14 December 2022 (UTC)[reply]

    Dear I.P. I think I agree. I note that when I click the first link
you provided, Twitter admits bias in algorithm for rightwing
politicians and news outlets it has a yellow banner at the top stating
that "This article is more than 1 year old".

    What is significant—and what your point seems to be if I
understand you correctly—is that article hails to a time when Twitter
was still under original management. So when Twitter responds, as
reported in The Guardian as follows: "Twitter said it wasn’t clear why
its Home timeline produced these results and indicated that it may now
need to change its algorithm", we would be ill-advised to disregard
common sense and common knowledge about the general nature of
corporate culture and CYA tactics when Twitter P.R. brass over a year
ago profess utter bafflement over how in the world their algorithms
could somehow be biased.

    I hope I have correctly interpreted your point, and if I have,
then I agree. And if I haven’t understood you correctly, then this
much seems clear: Outdated citations that precede the release of The
Twitter Files mustn’t be used in a manner that purports to rebut The
Twitter Files. Greg L (talk) 01:43, 14 December 2022 (UTC)[reply]


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