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Tuesday, July 31, 2012

TV / Teh Internets Twitter Apologizes for Being Dicks

Posted by Paul Constant on Tue, Jul 31, 2012 at 1:53 PM

Yesterday, we told you about Twitter banning sportswriter Guy Adams for calling out NBC's terrible Olympics coverage. I pointed out that it looks like Twitter suspended Adams's account because he was mocking NBC, and NBC has a corporate sponsorship with Twitter for the duration of the Olympics.

Overnight, the news broke that Twitter in fact alerted NBC to Adams's tweets and urged them to file a complaint, which eventually got Adams suspended from Twitter. This is about as shitty as it gets. Twitter is a communications service, and they should not have any control over what gets said on their service. They especially should not protect their corporate partners from criticism. Imagine your Hotmail account banning you because you're complaining about your XBox not working in an email to your friends and you have an idea of how bad this is.

Now, Twitter's general counsel, Alex Macgillivray, writes that Twitter has reinstated Adams's account and says that the company apologizes for their actions:

That said, we want to apologize for the part of this story that we did mess up. The team working closely with NBC around our Olympics partnership did proactively identify a Tweet that was in violation of the Twitter Rules and encouraged them to file a support ticket with our Trust and Safety team to report the violation, as has now been reported publicly. Our Trust and Safety team did not know that part of the story and acted on the report as they would any other.

As I stated earlier, we do not proactively report or remove content on behalf of other users no matter who they are. This behavior is not acceptable and undermines the trust our users have in us. We should not and cannot be in the business of proactively monitoring and flagging content, no matter who the user is — whether a business partner, celebrity or friend. As of earlier today, the account has been unsuspended, and we will actively work to ensure this does not happen again.

This is a good start, but Twitter had better make sure that they don't have too many more accidents like this one; people don't like it when their communication platform starts making judgment calls on their behalf.

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Comments (13) RSS

Oldest First Unregistered On Registered On Add a comment

This isn't about making it right, or apologizing. Twitter is covering their asses.

Let's say a jealous ex gives out their partner's contact info on Twitter. Someone then uses that contact info to harass or hurt them. They might sue Twitter for allowing this to happen.

Twitter would like to be able to claim that they have rules to discourage this behavior, but are unable to monitor the posting activity of individual users and shouldn't be held accountable.

Twitter has just demonstrated that they do have the ability to monitor what individuals post, and they make use of it. They've just hurt their defense in a case that's likely to come up sooner or later, many times over. They want to make this go away as quickly and quietly as possible.

Posted by Quasicheese on July 31, 2012 at 2:13 PM

You guys should totally tweet this.

Posted by mrbarky on July 31, 2012 at 2:34 PM

@1 more likely Twitter was watching this guy specifically because of his actions. Twitter, if they any legal sense, don't pro-actively police anything. If they take ANY editorial role it endangers their Safe Harbor provisions under the DMCA, for example. They do NOT want to be a publisher.

Posted by Joe Szilagyi

on July 31, 2012 at 2:34 PM

Imagine being banned by Google Groups because you went on the Finance group and mused that GOOG stock was due to drop when it was near 800 and scads of fanbois hit the Abuse button and now you can't log in even to the Group you yourself created and to which you uploaded documents.

Then imagine for 4 years you petitioned for them to restore your access and even complained loudly in public forums and yet no recourse was available,you just get the same form email without anyway to challenge a definite complaint with evidence.

Posted by Supreme Ruler Of The Universe

on July 31, 2012 at 2:46 PM

Sure, this looked bad. The guy was temporarily suspended for posting what looked like private information in violation of a stated policy. It doesn't seem crazily offensive that Twitter would follow-up to alert the person whose privacy had been violated.

But Twitter is a private company that provides a free service; they can make whatever rules they want.

Posted by Josh Bis

on July 31, 2012 at 2:47 PM

I think Paul may be the only person in the world who gives a shit about what happens on Twitter.

Posted by Fifty-Two-Eighty

on July 31, 2012 at 2:50 PM

@5 except that it wasn't private information. It was a corporate email address easily available to the public.

Posted by dirge on July 31, 2012 at 3:01 PM

@5 And they specifically stated that they do not, and cannot proactively monitor twitter comments.

The fact that they were monitoring this specific person because of a corporate sponsorship is pretty shitty. I believe that's what they're apologizing for.

And yes, they provide a free service and can make their own rules, but when the popularity of your service is somewhat tied to the ideal of free speech...these kind of stories could really come back and bite them in the ass.

Posted by Pick1 on July 31, 2012 at 3:08 PM

I completely agree: even though I find their explanation credible, this kind of story could damage their credibility and people could start using something else.

But, like all of the Facebook mini-scandals, this seems like yet another good reminder that this kind of profit-drawing activity that looks like free speech is happening not in a public square, but on a private company's service where they can and do set the rules of what can be said.

Posted by Josh Bis

on July 31, 2012 at 4:10 PM

And may I add my voice to what's being said about NbC's coverage of the Games? Just terrible. Here in Los Angeles, I miss having the CBC's (or CTV's) coverage which is understated for the most part, and most importantly in REAL TIME. You watch something 8-10 hours after you've read about it online. Most people have cable or satellite. Many have DVRs. NBC is catering to those who depend on OTA which is no longer a realistic market. Things have changed since 1964, guys.

But beyond that, the way they've handled the Phelps/Lochte thing is shameful. Fours years ago, NBC's staff was building golden idols and worshiping at the altar of Michael Phelps. He loses a competition or two and now he's the rundown has-been who let drugs and ennui destroy the tiger within. And Lochte? Well, he's the newborn King!

I just hate that kind of build 'em up/tear 'em down mindlessness. Why can't they just say that Phelps, a great and Hall of Fame swimmer, is having a bad day - like we all have? NBC and its team are really showing their red, raw monkey butts to the world. They need to rise above their reptilian "winners and everyone else" mentality and start celebrating the remarkable achievement of just making it to the Games.

Posted by Bauhaus I on July 31, 2012 at 6:04 PM

Corporate censorship. Gasp. Shocking.

Posted by woof on August 1, 2012 at 7:39 AM

Update to 10:

And now that Phelps has returned to form, NBC is once again praising his greatness and now Lochte is the disappointment. I don't know if NBC is to blame (they're fighting desperately for ratings and they paid a FORTUNE for the rights to this event) or that kind of color and commentary is expected from the American male (for surely its male driven) who watches sports on TV, but I sure do find it distasteful.

This I know for sure: I do miss the classy coverage (and team) ABC used to provide. If I'd known, for instance, how good Wild World of Sports was compared to things to come, I'd have paid more attention.

Posted by Bauhaus I on August 5, 2012 at 9:33 AM