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apple, ipod, touch (1)Aug 2009
The Trouble With Twitter
04/08/09 13:32 Filed in: Twitter
Despite myriad problems, glitches and lack of any real structure, Twitter has been championed by celebrities and has risen to the upper echelon of social media sites. However just because you can tweet doesn’t mean you should! Twitter has become the Mos-Isley space port of the internet, you may never find a more wretched hive of scum and villainy!
Security Problems
As I write this one of my Twitter accounts has been Hi-jacked and the activities of the Hijackers has caused the account to be suspended. This has become a common theme in the Twitterverse. I never thought it would happen to me but it seems that the real culprit is the right arm of the very outfit that is now my executioner. I am speaking of the Twitter API. The API is a bit of software that programmers and hackers alike can use to create applications for Twitter. The API actually allows you to create applications that are specifically designed to violate Twitter’s own terms of service. IT also contains several loopholes the size of a jumbo jet through which your account information can be stolen, and your account used to post advertising, phishing links and links to questionable material. In a post 911 world it may not be the best idea to use a service that opens you up to a situation where virtually anyone can speak ostensibly with YOUR VOICE! One might argue that this can’t happen unless you give out your user name and/or password, but it seems like pretty much ALL of the addon API generated services out there require this information and a growing number of these services are turning out to be completely and utterly bogus! Do you really want an account with your name on it to be hijacked and used to spread propaganda or worse sound the rallying cry for those who would seek to undermine the very fabric of American society? On top of all this you can very easily find yourself with a virus on your hard drive. You think your professor/boss will buy that the Trojan ate your homework again?
Could you be more vague?
It’s not as though Twitter makes no attempt to combat these problems, but it would be nice if they didn’t also cause most of them. The rules regarding what you can and cannot do with your account are extremely vague. You won’t know if you’ve crossed the line until it’s too late and your account is suspended. These suspensions are to last a MINIMUM of 30 days according to the Twitter web site. Some sort of warning might be a good idea or perhaps if they re-tooled their setup so it flat out does not allow any of the activities that could possibly warrant a suspension. This sort of problem seems to be the scourge of the web 2.0 world, where the applications seem to create more problems than they solve. Secondlife has the same problem with its search application. Users are gaming the current search system so rather than fix the search, they impose restrictions on everyone regardless of any wrongdoing on the part of the individual user. This creates an insurgency if you will, people who are now using Twitter to bash Twitter and tarnish the experience of its user base. This very article will be tweeted into Twitter by anyone using a service like Twitterfeed or Twit Robot to tweet the titles, descriptions and urls of my blog posts! I also might mention the fact that I am already looking for alternatives to Twitter and there are several out there that seem to have more features and guidelines that are much easier to understand and follow.
Spam, spam spam spam
I have read in several different articles, blog posts etc that 10% of the twitter population are responsible for 90% of the content! This is not social networking it’s broadcasting. And the message seems to be all about what people are eating for dinner or one simple trick that burns fat without working out! Twitter claims to be trying to limit the presence of aggressive online marketeers, and yet they still make up the bulk of Twitters regular users. Most of my new followers are trying to sell me something and they almost never respond to any message I send them, even then most time it’s an automated response. Twitter IS essentially spam for the most part. Except for updates from celebrities most tweets aren’t of interest to anyone anywhere. The more people you follow the more you seem to put yourself on the firing line where countless morons fire non-sequiturs into your personal space.
So in the final analysis you may ask yourself if subjecting your computer and yourself to Twitter is worth the potential downside. There are closed twitter like services like Shout em’ that allow you to have a twitter-like experience with in a network of friends that are there by invitation only. This is much more secure way to go. Also since this type of service is not open to the general public, you can pretty much run it however you like.
Security Problems
As I write this one of my Twitter accounts has been Hi-jacked and the activities of the Hijackers has caused the account to be suspended. This has become a common theme in the Twitterverse. I never thought it would happen to me but it seems that the real culprit is the right arm of the very outfit that is now my executioner. I am speaking of the Twitter API. The API is a bit of software that programmers and hackers alike can use to create applications for Twitter. The API actually allows you to create applications that are specifically designed to violate Twitter’s own terms of service. IT also contains several loopholes the size of a jumbo jet through which your account information can be stolen, and your account used to post advertising, phishing links and links to questionable material. In a post 911 world it may not be the best idea to use a service that opens you up to a situation where virtually anyone can speak ostensibly with YOUR VOICE! One might argue that this can’t happen unless you give out your user name and/or password, but it seems like pretty much ALL of the addon API generated services out there require this information and a growing number of these services are turning out to be completely and utterly bogus! Do you really want an account with your name on it to be hijacked and used to spread propaganda or worse sound the rallying cry for those who would seek to undermine the very fabric of American society? On top of all this you can very easily find yourself with a virus on your hard drive. You think your professor/boss will buy that the Trojan ate your homework again?
Could you be more vague?
It’s not as though Twitter makes no attempt to combat these problems, but it would be nice if they didn’t also cause most of them. The rules regarding what you can and cannot do with your account are extremely vague. You won’t know if you’ve crossed the line until it’s too late and your account is suspended. These suspensions are to last a MINIMUM of 30 days according to the Twitter web site. Some sort of warning might be a good idea or perhaps if they re-tooled their setup so it flat out does not allow any of the activities that could possibly warrant a suspension. This sort of problem seems to be the scourge of the web 2.0 world, where the applications seem to create more problems than they solve. Secondlife has the same problem with its search application. Users are gaming the current search system so rather than fix the search, they impose restrictions on everyone regardless of any wrongdoing on the part of the individual user. This creates an insurgency if you will, people who are now using Twitter to bash Twitter and tarnish the experience of its user base. This very article will be tweeted into Twitter by anyone using a service like Twitterfeed or Twit Robot to tweet the titles, descriptions and urls of my blog posts! I also might mention the fact that I am already looking for alternatives to Twitter and there are several out there that seem to have more features and guidelines that are much easier to understand and follow.
Spam, spam spam spam
I have read in several different articles, blog posts etc that 10% of the twitter population are responsible for 90% of the content! This is not social networking it’s broadcasting. And the message seems to be all about what people are eating for dinner or one simple trick that burns fat without working out! Twitter claims to be trying to limit the presence of aggressive online marketeers, and yet they still make up the bulk of Twitters regular users. Most of my new followers are trying to sell me something and they almost never respond to any message I send them, even then most time it’s an automated response. Twitter IS essentially spam for the most part. Except for updates from celebrities most tweets aren’t of interest to anyone anywhere. The more people you follow the more you seem to put yourself on the firing line where countless morons fire non-sequiturs into your personal space.
So in the final analysis you may ask yourself if subjecting your computer and yourself to Twitter is worth the potential downside. There are closed twitter like services like Shout em’ that allow you to have a twitter-like experience with in a network of friends that are there by invitation only. This is much more secure way to go. Also since this type of service is not open to the general public, you can pretty much run it however you like.