[tofuahdude]

You don't need to use Twitter's JS to show Tweets. If you choose to use their system, you're subject to their rules. If you don't like their rules, don't use their stuff.

Calling it "altering the public record" is a little hyperbolic imo. If you want to act as a repository for the public record, you better use your own system. Twitter is under no obligation to retain this kind of stuff on your behalf.

I'm not trying to say that this is right or wrong, just that these are the facts of the matter when you engage with a company's code and terms of service.

[hda2]

> Twitter is under no obligation to retain this kind of stuff on your behalf.

They declared something worked one way then silently changed how that thing works without properly announcing the change first and giving people enough time to adapt. Would you still be willing to make these excuses if your emails provider decided to do the same thing?

Even if it's their system, there's a limit where people would rightfully start to object.

[eddieroger]

If my email provider started doing something I don't like, shame on me for not saving a copy of my mail. Unless I'm explicitly paying them to keep a copy, which I'm pretty sure nobody using Twitter is doing, then they get to set the rules. And if I don't like the rules, I don't have to use the system, just like I wouldn't use a mail provider that deleted my mail without my action.

[bennyp101]

An email provider (which you most likely pay for - and don't publish on a website) is very different to a social media site (that you don't pay for and want it out in the public)

It's a free service that they provide - why can they not change how their system works when they want? People can object whenever they want - but it doesn't change the fact that they don't have any 'rights' to show someone elses content via a 3rd party on their website.

Maybe if you paid to embed tweets? Sure ok, they changed the contract - so deal with that.

Is it a bit annoying if you use it? Probably. Is it bad that the docs are out of date? Ok.

Twitter doesn't have any responsibility to you as someone who wants to quote someone else via their platform.

[fphhotchips]

I disagree. Twitter doesn't own that content. Someone posting the Twitter JS on their website to allow Twitter to format the tweet to Twitter's brand standards and allow a link to drive traffic back to Twitter is a favour that they're doing Twitter. They should respect that favour by not changing the contract unilaterally.

[bennyp101]

Yea, I don't think people are embedding tweets on their sites to do Twitter a favour ... it's because they want to reference something and part of the TOS says to use it.

[fphhotchips]

The TOS on quoting someone? You're saying that if I want to quote something someone says on Twitter in my book or in a newspaper, I have to follow their TOS and style it their way? No, I think not. Applying Twitter's styling to quotes is a nicety. It's nice for the blogger that it looks good on a blog and it's nice for Twitter that they get a link back and their branding guidelines get followed, but there's no way Twitter is going to be able to enforce their TOS on quoting something that someone else said just because it was said on their platform.

[theelous3]

This is hilariously disingenuous.

You rightly point out the ridiculous claim, noting people don't use embeds as a favour to twitter - and then make the ten times more ridiculous claim that people are using embeds because of the TOS.

At least try and hide the fact you're being bad faith if you're going to engage like this.

[LadyCailin]

But, you as the website operator don’t own that content either? Certainly I have some level of expectation that if I delete something, it may very well actually be gone, right? And further, that Twitter taking steps to do exactly that in places they control is reasonable?

[fphhotchips]

> Certainly I have some level of expectation that if I delete something, it may very well actually be gone, right?

Really? For me this is like saying that just because you stop actively publishing a book, people can never quote it again. That's clearly not true, right?

Edit: or because I didn't distribute recordings of a speech I made, newspapers can't quote me

[LadyCailin]

But I am not, nor do I aspire to be, a public figure. For notable people, and most certainly politicians, I might tend to agree with you, but not for the general case.

[montroser]

Unfortunately, it doesn't really matter if you disagree. They own the platform, and they can operate it how they please. There's no "changing of the contract" here. Their TOS certainly don't guarantee anything at all in exchange for website owners embedding tweets in this way. Any theoretical moral argument is kind of irrelevant.

[medler]

You, and many in these comments, seem to be conflating twitter’s legal rights with their informal social obligations. No one is saying this is illegal behavior by Twitter. Some are saying it’s very annoying of them to go back on their established policies and break thousands of websites.

[montroser]

I totally agree it's annoying, and at odds with what we would hope for their social obligations. So sure, shame on them.

But also, we could not actually expect anything different. The capitalist/corporate environment in which we operate will systematically compel these companies to choose profits over social obligations. They are accountable to their customers (advertisers), and so whatever moral transgressions we people on the street may perceive -- they don't really play into Twitter's decision-making...

[simonw]

If I embed your JavaScript on my page I am giving you a HUGE amount of my trust. You should treat that as sacred.

[montroser]

But why would you trust a corporation that owes you nothing?

[folkrav]

There's always some level of implicit trust the second you decide to use any platform.

[bennyp101]

Sure, and you would have done a risk assessment based on that.

I'm not sure why I (as a 3rd party social media platform) would treat your trust as sacred?

[nicce]

I would argue that statistically the most people don’t pay for their email provider with money. In that term not a very strong argument.

[bennyp101]

The "Would you still be willing to make these excuses if your emails provider decided to do the same thing?" statement I was replying to was a bit weak as weak :)

But in the case of not paying for your email, then that is also on you to acknowledge there is a set of terms, and you can adhere or not. I certainly wouldn't expect a free service to owe me anything.

[renewiltord]

Right. And I don’t have a responsibility to not kick up a fuss. So I’m going to kick up a fuss and hopefully people will want to use their APIs and SDKs a teensy bit less.

[simonw]

"If you want to act as a repository for the public record, you better use your own system."

I deliberately chose Twitter's JavaScript because I inspected the design of how it worked and saw that they had deliberately built it in a way that would respect my preferences for how deletion should be handled.

They've changed that on me - without even announcing the change. This is a rug-pull.

Now I have to replace their code with my own implementation, and they've hurt my trust.

[tom_]

Ask for your money back.

[0des]

I normally hate comments like this but damn I laughed till I died when I read this. Take care tom

[tom_]

Comment made only 1/3 in jest. If you’re not paying, you can’t expect much.

[renewiltord]

Why should I? I demand payment in public opinion because I can. You needn’t care but Twitter will pay from those that do.

[arprocter]

You joke, but Twitter Blue exists

[chaps]

Why did you trust them from the beginning? Serious question.

[epeus]

We trusted them because they were committed to being part of the wider web, and as you can see from Ben Ward's tweet at the time, took that seriously.

[tofuahdude]

Naive at best, honestly. Twitter from their very beginning has screwed over developers who used their platform. So have many of the other companies in their cohort.

[BlueTemplar]

You mean like when they removed their public API in 2014 ?

[tofuahdude]

Good. I hope you've learned that you shouldn't trust large companies.

[theelous3]

> Twitter is under no obligation to retain this kind of stuff on your behalf.

You have badly missed the most crucial message of the post.

When you copy the embed link, you are copying the string literal of the tweet too.

You put this text on your site. You are the one retaining it.

The twitter module is hiding the text from the rendered page, rather than loading the local copy.

[tofuahdude]

So, don't include their javascript. Its so simple.

[theelous3]

This is such a HN take. 99% of the people, even the ones who copy embed links, don't even know what js is. This is a problem for everyone, not just literally you and I.

[raverbashing]

Yes and it's tricky because in one side you're siding with the person that copied it, and in another, with the original author of the tweet.

[theelous3]

I don't know why you are (half) working off the presumption anyone cares about the post-hoc desire of the author.

This isn't tricky at all imo.

Just as if I pasted the text directly, I expect my copying of the content to have the same lifetime as the page I put it on. This is irrespective of anybody's wishes after the fact.

Nobody has the expectation that the text would disappear from my page if copied directly - so why should behavior change in any other case?

The original author of the tweet also has the intent. An unfortunate side effect of having a voice, is that sometimes people will listen and make notes.

[macspoofing]

>with the original author of the tweet.

Not necessarily. The example VOX article[1] had Trump's tweets embedded in the article, which are now hidden. Trump didn't delete those tweets. He was banned.

[1] https://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2018/4/13/17233422/d...

[raverbashing]

There are many more cases of deletions than banned ones, let's not think of the exception as the rule

And the blog author still has the text as well

[macspoofing]

>There are many more cases of deletions than banned ones, let's not think of the exception as the rule

But that isn't the exception. Banned users tend to be the ones that have some level of public interest, as evidenced by the VOX quote.

>And the blog author still has the text as well

That's right and maybe in some way this new policy accidentally leads to good things, in that it may incentive sites that embed Twitter's content on their page, to simply bypass that.

[batch12]

It is entertaining to watch the waves of opinion crash against each other when things happen that people don't like. The cognitive dissonance must must a deafening roar. On one hand, people get miffed when twitter changes their JS to block out quotes of deleted tweets, citing an alteration of the public record. On the other hand, people argue that twitter is not a "public square" and can do what they want with the content and users of their platform.

Edit: clarified js change

[quitit]

I feel a frequent problem in tech discussion is that the problem is greatly exaggerated, often to levels which are out of scope or come across as unreasonable demands. It has some similarities to Godwin's law.

The follow-up discussion then unfortunately is not so much about the grievance or problem, but about the needless hyperbole.

In the end, because the problem no longer feels reasonable or relatable, it seems more like the author has an axe to grind.

There's too many examples to cite, but one could follow any discussion that surrounds a change made by large tech company to find numerous examples.

[jeromegv]

It's almost like there's a diverse range of opinions and there isn't a monolithic Hackernews.

[batch12]

I have a hard time believing there isn't much crossover between those who want to punt opinions from a mainstream platform and those who want to nail someone down for a comment they made forever

[smaryjerry]

Right seems like people are confusing very different points of view: they can do it and they should do it. It’s like reviewing a murder case and seeing arguments talking past each other, one side saying “He was allowed to shoot his gun” and the other saying “He shouldn’t have shot his gun.” The arguments aren’t even on the same level and aren’t mutually exclusive. Both could be true, and the responses just ignore the others point completely.

[BlueTemplar]

And the crux of the issue is that a for profit corporation has been allowed to grow until it has become a de facto public square.

Even journalists, who really should know better are now quoting tweets.

[arprocter]

The 'private platforms can ban whoever they want to' crowd's reaction to the news of the latest addition to their board has been fun to watch

Talk about a double-edged sword

[macspoofing]

There's always a few that posts like this. Yes Twitter has a legal right to do stuff like this but can YOU separate what Twitter is legally allowed to do from what is the right thing to do? What's wrong with criticizing a particular policy from a corporate behemoth?

[tofuahdude]

The real issue is expecting that a for-profit company does "the right thing" according to some random moral compass.

[epeus]

If they want to change this, they can have a new version of the widgets script that makes it clear that it will edit your site, and switch to that in future embed links from the site. Changing the existing one is leaving holes all over the web. Buzzfeed is decimated.

[newswasboring]

> I'm not trying to say that this is right or wrong

Why are you not, though? I feel like we have been so co-opted by the system that we forgot we are allowed to criticize it. A giant company with billions of dollars should not be given get out of moral jail free cards. They should absolutely be held to higher standards because of all the power they wield.

[nobodyandproud]

I feel like two groups are talking over each other.

One is saying Twitter shouldn’t have done this and should be called out for breaking a promise.

The other group mostly agrees, but is pointing out that problem was giving Twitter so much control over one’s own content in the first place.

I agree with this: Banking on what’s nothing more than a handshake is a bad call.

Having to go to the court of public opinion is largely a failure, not the recourse of choice.

The commercial internet of today works this way, and it’s increasingly becoming fragile for it.

[newswasboring]

> I agree with this: Banking on what’s nothing more than a handshake is a bad call.

But shouldn't we be striving for a world where it isn't a bad call? Reputation used to mean something, I have read about it in old books. That was back when choice was a thing. Digg got destroyed in a matter of weeks because they did something users didn't like. Now Facebook is openly contributing to destroying democracy and all they get is one bad financial year. These things are way too big and wield way too much power.

And, with all due and undue respect, statements like yours are part of the problem. I don't know what your intent was, but you come off as defending twitter on this as there was no written contract. While everyone is equal under codified law, we shouldn't forget some people have more influence than others over what gets codified.

[nobodyandproud]

> But shouldn't we be striving for a world where it isn't a bad call? Reputation used to mean something,

Reputation isn’t proof. It also carries no context.

If the service is very meaningful to you, then why wouldn’t you want a legal contract?

> I don't know what your intent was, but you come off as defending twitter on this as there was no written contract. While everyone is equal under codified law, we shouldn't forget some people have more influence than others over what gets codified.

Case and point of reputation. You assume I’m defending Twitter, because you can’t imagine that I can agree that it’s a scummy move while also pointing out that it’s bad practice to rely on a company’s word.

As for my intent?

I’m annoyed, dealing with like-minded individuals and engineers.

Having to teach engineers that coding and behavioral contracts get broken, and so code must be written defensively; in a world where pushing out features and adoption is “impact” is quite the uphill battle.

It just took a couple of decades for businesses to realize that “free” has some severe hidden costs.

And appealing on social media hoping to get attention, in a world where there’s too much information and noise?

I’m flabbergasted.

[sacrosancty]

I think this is a little unexpected though since "you" are still hosting the text of the tweet on your site and publishing it to your visitors but also with a Twitter script that hides it.

[causi]

Doesn't that mean it should be pretty easy to automate converting all your "deleted" embedded Tweets to a local rendering, albeit without the integration back to Twitter?

[sacrosancty]

Probably, but hardly anyone will do that. It's not lost for good, just inconvenienced away.

[gentleman11]

I agreed with this several years ago, but I’m not sure any more. Software networks are very different than other things humans have had in the past. They are inherently winner take all and give the owner/creator unprecedented power over users that creators in past generations could only have dreamed of. I wonder if software companies should have some restrictions to make up for this