I absolutely agree, and the most I get from Twitter is from other people posting about it elsewhere. But there is a need for politicians to reach their constituents, and if they can be effectively reached by an imperfect method, then I can accept them using it while also promoting better methods.
But there is a need for politicians to reach their constituents, and if they can be effectively reached by an imperfect method,
Leaders should lead, not follow. Politicians can reach and be reached on a Mastodon server, where all their constituents have access.
Asking ~8 billion (or however many) people to make a personal change first is a non-starter. Demanding many orders of magnitude fewer people (politicians) make the first move to break the dystopian cycle is far more sensible.
then I can accept them using it while also promoting better methods.
Posting on Twitter is an assault on promoting better methods. Mirroring everything on Twitter facilitates the Tyranny of Convenience (great essay by Tim Wu) by making Twitter the superset. It’s important and socially responsible to withhold info from Twitter so that it cannot be the superset.
RMS gives good advice for orgs who think they need a Facebook presence:
Politicians don’t need a Twitter presence, but to the extent that they are not convinced, the bare minimum action they can take is implement some of the advice on that RMS page.
Any random 3rd party joe shmoe can make a Twitter bot that mirrors a politician’s msgs to Twitter. In fact, force Twitter to do the work simply by not feeding Twitter. Motivation for Twitter’s self-preservation would appropriately ensure gov resources are not spent on Twitter. Make Twitter be the host of dodgy mirror bots without engagement, where you need Mastodon to actually engage with a politician.
Nothing you said there actually disagrees with what I said, with the exception of abandoning Twitter completely, which I’m okay with in principle. The issue is that Twitter is currently an effective method to reach some subset of their constituents, regardless of how misguided they may be. Giving an alternative is also a bonus.
Face it, the number of people who know Mastodon exists is a fraction of Twitter users. Do you think it’s politicians’ job to provide technology education?
Do you think it’s politicians’ job to provide technology education?
Of course. Public education comes from the public sector. We should be electing politicians with administrations who are smarter than the general public. Any tech education that comes of Twitter abandonment is welcome.
I absolutely agree, and the most I get from Twitter is from other people posting about it elsewhere. But there is a need for politicians to reach their constituents, and if they can be effectively reached by an imperfect method, then I can accept them using it while also promoting better methods.
Leaders should lead, not follow. Politicians can reach and be reached on a Mastodon server, where all their constituents have access.
Asking ~8 billion (or however many) people to make a personal change first is a non-starter. Demanding many orders of magnitude fewer people (politicians) make the first move to break the dystopian cycle is far more sensible.
Posting on Twitter is an assault on promoting better methods. Mirroring everything on Twitter facilitates the Tyranny of Convenience (great essay by Tim Wu) by making Twitter the superset. It’s important and socially responsible to withhold info from Twitter so that it cannot be the superset.
RMS gives good advice for orgs who think they need a Facebook presence:
https://stallman.org/facebook-presence.html
Politicians don’t need a Twitter presence, but to the extent that they are not convinced, the bare minimum action they can take is implement some of the advice on that RMS page.
Any random 3rd party joe shmoe can make a Twitter bot that mirrors a politician’s msgs to Twitter. In fact, force Twitter to do the work simply by not feeding Twitter. Motivation for Twitter’s self-preservation would appropriately ensure gov resources are not spent on Twitter. Make Twitter be the host of dodgy mirror bots without engagement, where you need Mastodon to actually engage with a politician.
Nothing you said there actually disagrees with what I said, with the exception of abandoning Twitter completely, which I’m okay with in principle. The issue is that Twitter is currently an effective method to reach some subset of their constituents, regardless of how misguided they may be. Giving an alternative is also a bonus.
Face it, the number of people who know Mastodon exists is a fraction of Twitter users. Do you think it’s politicians’ job to provide technology education?
Of course. Public education comes from the public sector. We should be electing politicians with administrations who are smarter than the general public. Any tech education that comes of Twitter abandonment is welcome.