Tag: twitter

  • Twitter is where I go to feel bad

    Twitter is where I go to feel bad

    I just shared this thought about Twitter, Mastodon and Tumblr on Mastodon, and thought I’d share it here too. I feel like Twitter is where I go to feel bad out, well, everything. Mastodon is where I go to lose myself in interesting and generally uplifting posts about all sorts of topics (so much so…

  • Going dark on Twitter

    Going dark on Twitter

    Although I have been on Mastodon since about 2016, I only started using it pretty actively in the last month or so. Since then I have grown to really enjoy using the service. There are increasing numbers of people joining various Mastodon instances and enriching the broader Mastodon network. I have almost stopped using Twitter…

  • The greatest propaganda machine in history

    The greatest propaganda machine in history

    Sacha Baron Cohen recently spoke about how social media services have become the “greatest propaganda machine in history”. Much of the media’s focus, when reporting on his remarks, was on his attack on Facebook. While he certainly targeted Facebook, he also spoke about how Google, YouTube, and Twitter shape online discourse, and how they help…

  • A curious sequence of events with Google and its YouTube recommendations

    I noticed a curious sequence of events this morning. I responded to a tweet about Donald Trump’s latest tweet where he referred to his “great and unmatched wisdom” using the Twitter app on my Android phone – I then turned to our Android TV box where we were watching YouTube videos in the YouTube app,…

  • Twitter’s conversational problem is that it’s not suited to have one

    Twitter’s conversational problem is that it’s not suited to have one

    Recode’s article titled “How hard is it to have a conversation on Twitter? So hard even the CEO can’t do it.” highlights a perennial challenge on Twitter: having a coherent conversation about pretty much anything – There simply wasn’t enough room to have the kind of nuanced conversation the subject requires. It was symbolic of…

  • Like Twitter, but for reading (and not in a good way)

    Like Twitter, but for reading (and not in a good way)

    Jamie Rubin recently wrote about abridgement going too far when it comes to books in his post “Abridge, Too Far“. I’ve been thinking about abridgments lately because of an ad that keeps popping up on Facebook. It’s for a service called Blinkist. The service claims it allows you to “fit reading into your life.” It…

  • More thoughts about Micro.blog as an indie social network

    More thoughts about Micro.blog as an indie social network

    Brad Enslen is doing some great work over at Micro.blog, spreading the word about this innovative service. He published a post titled “The Case for Moving Your Social Network to Micro.blog“, that’s pretty self-explanatory. I think there’s certainly merit in shifting your social network over to something like Micro.blog, in the near term at least.…

  • Twitter threads make no sense to me

    Twitter threads make no sense to me

    Twitter threads make no sense to me. I also find then to be pretty frustrating. I’ve read some really interesting, and engaging Twitter threads (you probably have too). Every time I read one, I ask myself two questions: Why is this person going out of their way to share this story/their thoughts on a format…