[IfOnlyYouKnew]

Well, first of all, “tweets” don’t “trend”. Terms do. So this description feels off, already.

Next, I wonder, but don’t care enough to look it up, if this guy is adequately summarized by only mentioning his concern for children?

Screw that, I did look him up: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jay_Bhattacharya#COVID-19_pa.... He was one of the people behind the “Great” Barrington Declaration and, kn the early months of the pandemic, argued, among other things, that COVID is rather harmless. He also took money from the airline industry without disclosing as much in his publications.

It’s arguable if Bhattacharya’s reach needed to be limited. What’s really hard to argue is that the thing about children is an adequate characterization of his statements during the pandemic. This is prime evidence that this story is not presenting anything close to a fair interpretation of the documents they have been given, and that you have, unfortunately, fallen for it.

[scifibestfi]

He's a Dr. and a Stanford professor of medicine. The Great Barrington Declaration was signed by almost a million doctors. They were warning about the harm lockdowns would do to kids and they were correct.

Even if they weren't, this would still be unacceptable.

[anigbrowl]

The Great Barrington Declaration was signed by almost a million doctors

You're off by an order of magnitude and then some. Also, none of the numbers they do claim are verifiable. https://gbdeclaration.org/view-signatures/

You know, when you make a specific claim like that it's really worth the 30 seconds it takes to check it again to verify your memory is correct.

[joshuamorton]

According to its own website, the great barrington declaration was signed by around 15,000 doctors.

[scifibestfi]

Thanks. I didn't realize there was a further breakdown from the 934,094 total and can't edit it now. Here's the exact breakdown.

medical & public health scientists: 15,989

medical practitioners: 47,278

concerned citizens: 870,827

[neuronexmachina]

FYI, anybody who wants to can sign the "Great Barrington Declaration," and check whatever box they want: https://gbdeclaration.org/#sign

The list of medical practitioners and scientists includes a number of homeopaths and obvious fake names.

[philjohn]

Sounds like appeal to authority, a logical fallacy.

[Georgelemental]

Exactly, you can't trust any authority (Twitter moderation team included) to determine truth for you.

[IfOnlyYouKnew]

As I said, it’s debatable if the guy’s reach needed to be limited, the point you are arguing.

What’s not debatable is that the breathless outrage-bait under discussion misrepresented the case for limiting the Dr’s reach with a straw-man argument, and so did you.

[indoclay]

> misrepresented the case for limiting the Dr’s reach

Could you help me understand what the argument is that this person should have been put on any form of blacklist?

[sergiotapia]

All of that is irrelevant. Twitter had a secret blacklist. Gross behavior from a gross company.

[etchalon]

EVERY social network has a "secret" blacklist. Every. single. one.

[stale2002]

So then the problem is worse than people thought.

I am glad that you agree that this is such a huge problem, and it is a good thing that now more people are away of how extensive it is.

[philjohn]

Guess what, Hacker News does too.

Try working in integrity for a few years, you'll realise why these things are necessary, because people just won't stop being jerks.

[stale2002]

Twitter being one of the largest communication platforms in the world is something that I am much more concerned about than a much smaller internet forum.

So my point stands.

[IfOnlyYouKnew]

A “secret blacklist” that’s been known forever, or at least for two years: https://twitter.com/dancow/status/1601017194456186881?s=20&t...

[rhaksw]

... and I've worked on Reveddit for four years. Less than 1% of Redditors know that all removed comments are secretly removed.

It's hard to make people care about this stuff. Most of us only start to see the harm of something when it's shown in context. Just showing that something can be theoretically harmful isn't enough.

[NaturalPhallacy]

TYVYS shadowbanning and silently removing comment is such cowardly behavior. Against spam bots, fine. But against what are obviously real people? It's wrong.

[rhaksw]

TYVYS?

[tyvysexplainer]

"Thank You For Your Service", but with a typo on the middle letter.

[veec_cas_tant]

Here is an announcement from 2018[0]:

>“It’s shaping up to be one of the highest-impact things that we’ve done,” the chief executive, Jack Dorsey ,said of the update, which will change how tweets appear in search results or conversations. “The spirit of the thing is that we want to take the burden off the person receiving abuse or mob-like behavior.”

> The new system will use behavioral signals to assess whether a Twitter account is adding to – or detracting from – the tenor of conversations...

> The updated algorithm will result in certain tweets being pushed further down in a list of search results or replies, but will not delete them from the platform.

[0]: https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2018/may/15/twitter-r...

[rhaksw]

IMO that's fine, but if you want me to trust such a system, the author should see on their tweet some indication that it's been demoted.

[jdminhbg]

> The updated algorithm will result

These screenshots are about actions taken by Twitter employees, not an updated algorithm.

[michaelgrosner2]

Why is that gross? It's their speech to decide what they want to promote or not promote. Why are you anti-free speech?

[Georgelemental]

Not when the platform (a) benefits from network effects that make it immune from private sector free market competition (b) actively colludes with government officials

[rhaksw]

It's not trustworthy when a system actions a user's content without telling them. Free speech principles are also a thing.

The question is not what is getting demoted, it's how. In this case, it's being done secretly, and Twitter isn't the only one doing it:

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=33916414

[belltaco]

This outrage is hilarious coz HN shadowbans people too. Which increases site quality which is why all the complainers are on here.

[rhaksw]

Transparently removing content is the normal way to moderate a forum. This research [1] suggests it reduces mod workload because users learn the rules. Discourse doesn't secretly remove content and is popular.

It isn't accurate to say secrecy increases site quality. No such qualitative study has been done.

[1] https://www.reddit.com/r/science/comments/duwdco/should_mode...

[belltaco]

That's talking about article submissions, not comments. Couldn't read the PDF because the link is broken.

More than 95% of the time I see a flagged account on HN, they post complete garbage that leads to more flaming replies if not removed promptly. HN has a very limited set of moderators, like one or two, who cannot police every comment 24/7.

>Discourse doesn't secretly remove content and is popular.

Popular where? In corporate and niche business use cases? What are some public Discourses that allow everyone to post?

[dotnet00]

HN has an option to be able to see the removed content.

[anigbrowl]

No. I don't assume I have any rights other than vis-a-vis the government. I've dealt with a lot of corporate bullshit from tech companies, it's an annoyance but I just handle it and don't make a career out of whining about it as some do.

I've been arrested and kept in jail overnight on false charges for being a political activist, people complaining about being in Twitter or facebook jail don't impress me much (especially when almost all of them have a backup account).

[rhaksw]

Presumably you eat at restaurants whose food you like and buy hardware whose quality you like. It's the same with social media. You can give attention to systems you support and share information about them. The alternative you propose sounds like cowering to company overlords.

And where are you that it is illegal to be a political activist?

[anigbrowl]

I live in the good old USA, where I have the privilege to be a member of the underclass.