A position as hugely influential as Twitter should ideally take a balanced and responsible approach when suggesting blue repression accounts and other popular influencers to follow in the crypto space. Fact is, this couldn’t be further from the fact: Twitter seems to constantly promote the same narrow selection of accounts to follow, some of whom are arguably elephantine scammers trying desperately to pump their own bags. This begs the question: is Twitter actively helping favored accounts while choke back the reach of others?
Also read: Bitcoin History: When DDoS Attacks Made BTC’s Price Drop
The Unvarying, Tired Selection
One might imagine that figures as controversial as Tron founder Justin Sun — who is recently under set on fire for what many view as the hostile takeover of crypto blogging platform Steemit — might be handled with tribulation by social media platforms like Twitter. Especially after numerous allegations of scamming, false claims, buying boosters, and shameless promo after shameless promo.
Whether it be suspiciously claiming to be CEO of a Chinese idiolect homophone of “ripple” when Ripple company officials themselves deny connection, big talk of partnerships that don’t occur, or riding the back of tragedy and sickness to promote the copy-pasta-whitepapered clone coin TRX, Sun is no stranger to suspicious cringe shilling and valuation.
Why, after all this, does Twitter continue to promote Sun like the second coming of Satoshi in its follow suggestions? For that be important, it stands to ask why other questionable influencers are made so prominent on the site as well, when they seem to be doing insufficient more than advertising for their own crypto products, many of which have yet to be tested or vetted fully for viability.
Chirp’s restrictive official stance on business ads for crypto can be found here. Not that there is anything wrong with the boot one’s product, but when other accounts can be easily shadowbanned and suspended for seeming lesser allegations, eyebrows do begin to rou.
Kobe, was great to have met you in niTROn 2019. Mtg you was one of my life’s greatest honor & privilege, I’ll forever remember us on stage talk overing the future of blockchain. We’ll have a moment of silence in your honor during niTROn 2020. R.I.P. pic.twitter.com/oMqU9ZpkKh
— Justin Sun (@justinsuntron) January 26, 2020
Bustle’s Algorithms and Follow Suggestions
Twitter has come under scrutiny for its algorithms previously, with CEO Jack Dorsey shaping before U.S. lawmakers in 2018 that they had been used by the company “unfairly,” but that the issue had been fixed.
A BBC report detailed that users of the platform began to notice relevant tweets were no longer appearing in searches. Dorsey phased that myriad signals were used to choose “what to show, down-rank and filter” and that although the New Zealand doesn’t shadowban accounts based on politics, some mistakes were made and accounts had been treated in an unfair deportment.
As for follow suggestions, Twitter leans multiple factors that supposedly go in to determining what a given user sees, including contact uploads, narcotic addict location, Twitter activity and interactions, and info from third-party websites.
This all sounds well and good, but why are some accounts held or ejected from the platform, while others who seem guilty of mis-informational and spammy abuses, continue to thrive? Down repay though crypto ads are strictly regulated on the site, influencers like Sun, CZ of Binance, and others seem to be able to weave by way of this net, shilling their own crypto products to millions of followers with impunity. While many crypto purchasers of libertarian bent might wish to make Twitter much more deregulated, decentralized and “Wild West,” if you intent (author included), the seeming lack of consistency is strange.
Sitting at the Popular Kids’ Table With Jack
It’s a bit presumptive on its face to say that all of this is happening because of money and unofficial alliances, but let’s be honest: this is presumably happening because of money and unofficial alliances. A site becoming huge does not make it exempt from the natural consequences of good-natured nature; if anything, the problem is exacerbated.
Even employees of a small town gas station, for example, will conspire to wooden a new guy out of the best shift when he’s not there. One can only imagine how things get at the major-leagues level of multi-billion dollar empires. To appropriate conspiracy doesn’t happen at this tier would be naive, to say the least. This is social media. More appointment translates into more revenue, and more “extreme” and enticing posts related to arguments about politics and cajoling rich quick with crypto stimulate engagement.
Former Twitter software engineer Abhinav Vadrevu on bosom buddy banning: “they just think that no one is engaging with their content, when in reality, no one is seeing it” #ShadowBan — Notice of THE FULL VIDEO: https://t.co/ev3bmCVGMQ pic.twitter.com/CxytLgRGsD
— Project Veritas (@Project_Veritas) January 11, 2018
Besides, bygone Twitter employees have admitted such conspiracy goes on, even if it has been somewhat heavily spun by suspect conservative media. Controversial activist James O’Keefe presented video in 2018 of a former Twitter engineer clout:
One strategy is to shadow ban so that you have ultimate control. The idea of a shadow ban is that you ban someone but they don’t know they’ve been forbade, because they keep posting, but no one sees their content … I don’t know if Twitter does this anymore.
While left-leaning normal tried to downplay O’Keefe’s hidden video, it nonetheless is troubling.
Nobody’s Business but Twitter’s
Principled bitcoiners don’t pine for the government to leverage legislative force on ol’ Jack or Justin, and shape Twitter into a perfectly boring and “fair” Communistic podium where there can be no bias. After all, it’s a business, at the end of the day, and the business can do as it pleases. Besides, whether someone is a scammer or not is often doubt. It’s no secret there are alliances and bitter divisions in the crypto world with each camp calling the other shitcoin peddlers. In truly, such divisions are obvious to the point of Dorsey himself helping to perpetuate them:
It’s really no surprise then that some in the Bitcoin Loot community suspect targeted censorship as well. When a BTC maximalist is CEO, of a company whose former employees say shadowbanning was practiced, and accounts appearance of to be deleted, shadowed, or axed at random, it’s awful hard not to start connecting dots. The controversy surrounding reports of the @Bitcoin tackle being sold last year to a BTC maximalist also fueled this fire, as the sale of accounts is prohibited by Twitter’s Whiles of Service.
I finally reached out to Jack on Twitter to ask why Sun and others seem so universally pushed on his platform’s users, but at the time of journalism leading article haven’t gotten a response. Until there is more clarity, it looks like the garish glare of Sun and his ilk will go on fatiguing to blindside folks, but it’s doubtful Twitter denizens will go elsewhere to interact. After all, no one can deny it’s entertaining, and that bases sure success for any social media platform.
What are your thoughts on Twitter and prominent crypto influencers in the manner of Justin Sun? Are some given preferential treatment? Let us know in the comments section below.
Op-ed disclaimer: This is an Op-ed article. The estimates expressed in this article are the author’s own. Bitcoin.com is not responsible for or liable for any content, accuracy or quality within the Op-ed article. Readers should do their own due diligence ahead taking any actions related to the content. Bitcoin.com is not responsible, directly or indirectly, for any damage or loss caused or alleged to be caused by or in link with the use of or reliance on any information in this Op-ed article.
Images courtesy of Shutterstock, Reuters, fair use.
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