Want to read Slashdot from your mobile device? Point it at m.slashdot.org and keep reading!

 



Forgot your password?
typodupeerror
×
Twitter Censorship Communications Government Social Networks

How Will You React To Twitter's Regional Censorship Plan? 181

Despite (and probably partly because of) its much-touted role as a communications link in the Arab Spring protest movements of the last year, Twitter announced a few days ago that it could be (which I take to mean "will be, and probably are") selectively blocking tweets based on local governments' requests. This AP story (as carried by stuff.co.nz) gives an overview of the negative reaction this move has drawn; unsurprisingly, there's talk of a boycott. The EFF has what seems to be a fair look at the reality of Twitter take-downs, noting that for various reasons they remove certain content already, but not as much as some parties would like; VentureBeat looks at the thousands of take-down notices the company received last year. If you use Twitter, does the recently announced region-specific blocking change what you'll use it for?
This discussion has been archived. No new comments can be posted.

How Will You React To Twitter's Regional Censorship Plan?

Comments Filter:
  • I won't (Score:5, Funny)

    by Pete Venkman ( 1659965 ) on Sunday January 29, 2012 @11:37AM (#38857799) Journal
    I won't react.
    • Re:I won't (Score:5, Insightful)

      by jhoegl ( 638955 ) on Sunday January 29, 2012 @11:40AM (#38857835)
      I will, by continuing to not have a twitter account or pay attention to tweets
      • Re:I won't (Score:4, Interesting)

        by TheGratefulNet ( 143330 ) on Sunday January 29, 2012 @11:54AM (#38857967)

        twitter and facebook remind me SO MUCH of the cb craze in the 70's.

        you could spot the unintelligent ones easily. they 'liked' cb.

        today, the fools 'like' fb and twit.

        its always handy to have a 'fools identification' device of some kind or another, isn't it?

        on topic: I'll be happy to see those services (that are centrally controlled and owned by ONE COMPANY (each) fail due to people not wanting to deal with censorship. I really miss the old days where the USENET model was popular. you know, not one single company owning it, not one single place to spy on people, not one single place to filter what the people want to say and see and hear. then, web-based this and that came into playing and websites are owned by single entities, not 'the people'. that was the start of the end of net.freedom.

        I hope fb and T die. they are not really freedom based, are they? we used to have mass communication tools that were truly freedom based. mabye we can revisit them again, in some other way?

        if a single company or group is behind it, its bad. yes, including the beloved google, too.

        • by geogob ( 569250 )

          Maybe I was too young in the 70's to see what was really going on, but looking back at the state of things as I started to get aware of such things - and very young I already was a "techno-freak" so to say - I believe the comparison is difficult.

          On one side, you are correct, it seems like the same kind of craze. On the other hand, the so called social media craze (I'm including in that the full spectrum, from twitter, to myspace) seems quite more widespread than the cb on the 70's. I believe it is less than

          • Re:I won't (Score:5, Insightful)

            by vlm ( 69642 ) on Sunday January 29, 2012 @12:16PM (#38858139)

            On the other hand, the so called social media craze (I'm including in that the full spectrum, from twitter, to myspace) seems quite more widespread than the cb on the 70's.

            The numbers are much smaller than CB. Here's an interesting article.

            http://billcrosby.com/socialmedia/how-many-twitter-users-are-there-really-graph/ [billcrosby.com]

            Depending on how you interpret the data, around 1 in 50 americans actually use twitter. At one point in the 70s, darn near 1 in 10 cars had a CB radio installed.

            If you think about it, it makes sense. Most people have nothing to say, and are not interested in passively listening to others. Also its exceedingly circular, its not a surprise that most of the people you personally hang out with are into social media if you define the persons you hang out with as people who are into social media... This is the "everyone is a trekkie" effect where all the trekkies hang out together believing the entire world is trekkies because everyone they know is a trekkie.

            • I think one of the reasons CB had as big of a share as it did, was the relative lack of other options. There were no cell phones. (Even long distance phone calls were expensive) Radiotelephones were extremely expensive to use, and ham radio required passing a test involving regulations and technology (and Morse code at that time). Of course the ways people interact now are more diverse.

              It's ironic that efforts to throttle/censor expression or unrest may very well fuel feelings of dissent. Having a gove

              • Kids opening up PC power supplies sounds like a very harsh form of population control 8-(

              • by vlm ( 69642 )

                I think one of the reasons CB had as big of a share as it did, was the relative lack of other options.

                Also it had a theoretical marketing purpose. At least you could tell yourself it was for reporting traffic accidents and finding out about traffic jams. It didn't really work well for that, which is why it rapidly went away. But at least during the boom it had a coherent and believable reason for existing.

                Twitter? Well, without twitter, I'd, um, ... use email which is free instead of expensive SMS? Or without twitter, I'd... I donno. It seems to serve no unique purpose, or even any useful purpose.

        • by Hentes ( 2461350 )

          And by 'fools' I guess you mean 'people with social lives'. Also, if you look at the state of p2p communication tools you will see why they are done by big companies: they have the evil money to actually develop them.

          • Re:I won't (Score:5, Insightful)

            by betterunixthanunix ( 980855 ) on Sunday January 29, 2012 @12:37PM (#38858303)
            I am neither on Twitter nor on Facebook, and...
            1. I have a girlfriend
            2. I am routinely invited to parties
            3. I have friends who share various interests with me
            4. I talk to my friends, family, girlfriend, acquaintances, etc.

            So what was that about people with social lives? Where I am from, one's social life is not defined by some website's list of followers, friends, freaks, or whatever else.

            • over or under 30 ?

              I am over 30, for me and almost everyone I know in the age group, what you said is true. However, for almost any 20-something I know, the opposite is true. So I postulate that this is a generational thing

              • Actually I am 24, so I suppose that I am a counterexample to your postulate. Why would older adults' social interactions differ from younger adults'?
                • Why would older adults' social interactions differ from younger adults'?

                  It is explained in detail here [youtube.com], here [youtube.com] and here. [youtube.com]

                  Or if you don't have the time for all that, this basically sums it up. [youtube.com]

                • Because that's how things work. If we always acted like our parents then our society wouldn't have advanced as much as it has. I'm not saying he's entirely right in regards to facebook or twitter (especially with picking the cut off at 30) but it is safe to assume communication amongst generations has changed.
              • Yeah I'm a 20-something and I don't use social networking, my social life is pretty dead but that's at least partly due to the type of crowd around here. But let me quote a friend of mine who's a total party animal and has a very active social life:

                "These days if you ain't on BBM and Facebook, you're nobody. That's no joke."

            • While you and your friends were not paying any attention to current events, commercial banks got deregulation passed in the late 90's that them gamble with YOUR checking accout balance like a investment banker? They fucked up so bad they crashed the world's economy and doubled out debt in less than 15 years

              Being uninformed is NOT cool.

              The protest movement against what those criminals bankers is all being organized online.

              • While you and your friends were not paying any attention to current events

                What makes you think that I am not paying attention to current events?

                The protest movement against what those criminals bankers is all being organized online.

                ...because "online" is now the same thing as "using Facebook and Twitter."

        • Re:I won't (Score:5, Interesting)

          by RJFerret ( 1279530 ) on Sunday January 29, 2012 @12:28PM (#38858237)

          Twitter lost me when they ruined their search capability.

          Google+ easily replaced it, more convenient than Twitter, Email, video conferencing beats telephone, etc.

          But the CB analogy doesn't hold water, as Google+ replaced email/phone for many people I interact with, they are non-technical, so find it more convenient. Meanwhile my technical friends appreciate it too, given the control and ease they have with the tool.

          The only frustrating part, telephones used to be ubiquitous. Nowadays, some people never check voicemail, some people never answer the phone but rely on voicemails; some people expect texts, some never text; some email, some consider email old-school/too formal; some use Twitter, some use Google+ (thankfully nobody in my varied social circles used Facebook)--to contact anyone requires not just knowing their number/address/handle/whatever, but also knowing what their preferred communication medium is!

        • I'll be happy to see those services (that are centrally controlled and owned by ONE COMPANY (each) fail due to people not wanting to deal with censorship

          Except that most people will continue to use these systems, and when it comes time to talk about taboo/censored topics they will just used commonly understood code words. People are not going to give up on Twitter because of censorship, just like they did not give up on Facebook because of censorship, or the App Store, or any number of other systems that engage in censorship. The number of people who really care and really want to end censorship is extremely small; most people just want to live their li

        • Re: (Score:2, Interesting)

          by Anonymous Coward

          Herpderp.

          I "like" facebook because it got me in contact with a friend that I hadn't spoken to since I left england when I was in the 6th grade.

          I "like" facebook because some of my friends, including my significant other, make funny posts or post funny pictures.

          I "like" facebook because with my busy personal life, where I have *maybe* 2 1/2 days of free time to myself per week, I can easily keep up with my friends and they don't have to feel rushed or pressured to talk to me right away.

          Nothing that I put up

        • by mvar ( 1386987 )
          The saddest thing about twitter & fb is that they are used by the majority of the teenagers, who in all their enthusiasm to talk-connect-post photos with others and lacking the experience needed to discriminate what one should and what one shouldn't post in the web about himself, they have no sense of the value of privacy. And when they finally "get it" after a few years, it will probably be too late for them
        • Re:I won't (Score:5, Informative)

          by Dhalka226 ( 559740 ) on Sunday January 29, 2012 @02:04PM (#38858797)

          its always handy to have a 'fools identification' device of some kind or another, isn't it?

          Yes. For example, I have had much success identifying self-important twats with superiority compelxes by their incessant need to talk about how much smarter they are than anybody who uses Facebook or Twitter.

        • by Dan541 ( 1032000 )

          on topic: I'll be happy to see those services (that are centrally controlled and owned by ONE COMPANY (each) fail due to people not wanting to deal with censorship. I really miss the old days where the USENET model was popular. you know, not one single company owning it, not one single place to spy on people, not one single place to filter what the people want to say and see and hear. then, web-based this and that came into playing and websites are owned by single entities, not 'the people'. that was the start of the end of net.freedom.

          I totally agree, the USENET style model is better.

          It's interesting/annoying how many people insist on using Facebook rather than Email. Despite the fact that Facebook is so limited and controlled by only one company. Something I find concerning is how many groups set themselves up only on Facebook in place of hosting their own website, Facebook seems to be replacing the website for allot of people.

        • I was thinking this could open up an opportunity for a Twitter competitor. Something with multiple mirrored servers running in a failover arrangement, running on darknets with a web-to-darknet portal as the main site. Maybe start with the identi.ca source code.

      • by DoninIN ( 115418 )
        Amazingly, that will be my reaction as well. The ability to broadcast txt messages indiscriminately, and read the txts of others broadcast thusly. Just doesn't do anything for me.
        • "The ability to broadcast txt messages indiscriminately, and read the txts of others broadcast thusly. Just doesn't do anything for me."

          Exactly! We've had LISTSERV since 1986 which does exactly the same thing (without the size limits) but its use has eroded after the WWW was invented.

    • ...because I will continue to not use Twitter at all.
      • by Megane ( 129182 )

        I'm not a Twitting Twat, so I can't care about this. Nor am I a Farcebooker.

        In fact, I detest the trend of every website to have these obnoxious pop-up "friend" and "share" buttons that go to there and a few other lame hipster sites, such as Redduuhh. When /. added that a few weeks ago, I promptly added the icons image to my AdBlock, though the cursor still changes over that area. (Of course all of sharethis.com was already in my AdBlock.)

      • ...because I will continue to not use Twitter at all.

        Likewise. I even dare to hope that the regular news media will soon relegate twitter-derived "news" to an appropriate small-print corner. While it preserves the superficiality of any message in the typical tweet, this geographical/national segregation and potential censorship will eviscerate what little plausibility they had.

    • by SteveFoerster ( 136027 ) <steveNO@SPAMstevefoerster.com> on Sunday January 29, 2012 @02:44PM (#38859033) Homepage

      I think we're in a battle for the heart and soul of the Internet, and that Twitter just announced they're on the bad guys' side. So my response was to delete my Twitter account, tell the company why I did so in their contact us form, and blog about it [elearners.com].

    • Re:I won't (Score:4, Interesting)

      by Blue Stone ( 582566 ) on Sunday January 29, 2012 @03:37PM (#38859343) Homepage Journal

      I'll react. I'll be quite pleased. Because it won't work.

      Any censored Tweet will be retweeted, both through Twitter's atuto-retweet function and manually. If Twitter censor auto-re-tweets, then 'fine'. But they won't be able to censor manual re-tweets.

      All it will take is for someone in a censored country to mention that they can't see a certain tweet, and someone in a non-censored country can manually re-tweet it.

      The censoring country's courts would then have to apply for each re-tweet or subsequent Tweet mentioning the same information to be censored.

      All this will do will raise the profile of the censorship taking place and raise awareness in the censorees that they are being controlled by those doing the censoring.

      And that will influence those being controlled to become more active in the defense of the freedoms. All-in-all, a good outcome.

  • by nurb432 ( 527695 ) on Sunday January 29, 2012 @11:38AM (#38857807) Homepage Journal

    Is now out the window. Expect tons of lawsuits due to content posted/saved/viewed. They will now be liable for the content to, not just the end users.

    Not a good status to lose, with the upcoming legislation like SOPA..

    • They would be held liable regardless.. It was a business decision based on the advice of bean counters and lawyers. However those who don't react negatively to censorship of any kind will obviously approve of this.

      • Still, the decision is baffling. Twitter got huge amounts of good publicity during the Arab Spring, and now they've decided they'll censor based on country? WTF?

        • They might get caught stepping on the wrong toes. They are following orders. They are too valuable as a propaganda tool to just allow to run wild. And "Arab Spring" is about as real as Arab Unicorns.

      • I'm a bit on the fence. I don't like mandated censorship (by governments), but I'm sometimes okay with private entities censoring themselves. The problem here is that Twitter seems to be bending to the will of the various governments, and doing so in a time when it's best to act out against those governments. However, something else that I must consider is that if it doesn't comply, it might have to be banned by those governments, so this might actually allow them to be more useful there. After all, people

    • by Mistlefoot ( 636417 ) on Sunday January 29, 2012 @11:58AM (#38858001)
      "common carrier" status is an internal (as in inside the country) concept.

      Common carrier often prevent content from reaching beyond the countries borders.

      Anyone who lives in Canada sees this all the time with big US providers blocking content to Canada. And the reverse is true as well, where Canada prevents (or tries) certain content from getting in.

      Twitter blocking content sent to Canada would not be much different then US superbowl ads being blocked from coming into Canada on the cable/satellite feeds. That it's done for copyright reasons over whatever reasons is not Twitter's issue. That they may choose to try to attempt to obey the laws of the countries they are blocking tweets to (at least I would gather this is why they would be blocking any tweets) has little to do with "common carrier" status.
      • Re: (Score:3, Funny)

        by Anonymous Coward

        Anyone who lives in Canada sees this all the time with big US providers blocking content to Canada. And the reverse is true as well, where Canada prevents (or tries) certain content from getting in.

        Then why can't Canada do something useful for once and block things like Justin Bieber, Bryan Adams and Celine Dion from getting into this country.

      • by Mistlefoot ( 636417 ) on Sunday January 29, 2012 @12:05PM (#38858067)
        To add to my above post:

        If I ship a bag of weed via purolator courier, purolator has no idea what it is and it is protected. Purolator is not expected, and should not ever, be opening my package to see what it is. When purolator reaches the border, purolator would, as a common carrier, not be able to DEMAND that the package not be opened or checked or what not.

        But the grand parent suggests that if purolator allowed the border to stop the package, they would lose common carrier status and that simply is incredibly speculative.
    • Is now out the window. Expect tons of lawsuits due to content posted/saved/viewed. They will now be liable for the content to, not just the end users.

      Not a good status to lose, with the upcoming legislation like SOPA..

      Appeasing governments will make Twitter less vulnerable to legal issues. Governments will now like Twitter rather than fear it, and have incentive to protect and promote it rather then other ways of communicating on the internet. This is an economic move, buying corporate stability at the expense of the users. RIM, Microsoft, Cisco and many other companies have followed this same strategy of appeasing governments at the expense of users.

    • They are not common carriers. Most ISPs try to avoid the designation "Common Carrier" because it gives them extra legal obligations.
    • by stms ( 1132653 )

      This pushing closer and closer to using a VPN for everything I do online.

      • by nurb432 ( 527695 )

        VPN to where? When all the endpoints are insecure too, what is the point of the extra overhead/cost?

        • by stms ( 1132653 )

          Hopefully will be able to find a non-extraditing country with decent infrastructure that also respects freedom of speech. Admitidly (and sadly) that's a pretty tall order.

  • Don't know. (Score:5, Informative)

    by An Ominous Coward ( 13324 ) on Sunday January 29, 2012 @11:38AM (#38857811)

    I'll probably go with "continue to not use twitter".

    • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

      by Seumas ( 6865 )

      Yeah, since I'm neither a twelve year old girl nor a "professional blogger", I'll probably just continue to not use the shitty service. They can do what they like with it and those who don't like the changes will maybe get a clue and move on to something less fucking inane.

      • by gl4ss ( 559668 )

        will you continue(or start to) to ignore to read any news items originating from twitter and twitter like services?

        you don't actually need to use twitter to be affected by information released via tweets(slashdot had dozens of stories last year which the original release for company and private individual released information was done via twitter).

        I very, very rarely read tweets from twitter. however at least weekly I end up reading some news post for which the information comes from/through some tweet.

    • I've always felt twitter was one of the stupidest ideas ever. I've never used it, and don't plan on using it. So they can do whatever the fuck they want and I just do not care at all.

      If they went out of business tomorrow my only response would be "Good."

      I'll have to quote the grand master Lewis Black on twitter: "And if you're twittering, fuck you! Where do you get the massive ego to think that anybody gives a shit what you're doing?"

    • I'll probably go with "continue to not use twitter".

      I will do the same but at the same time I might also do a lot of not caring.

  • That's a great idea! (Score:4, Interesting)

    by Weaselmancer ( 533834 ) on Sunday January 29, 2012 @11:40AM (#38857833)

    Now that they are saying they are willing and able to police every message that goes through their system, they are now responsible for content. Lawyers everywhere rejoice.

    So now if anyone tweets anything illegal or uses twitter in the process of committing a crime, Twitter opens itself up to legal repercussions. If they can censor some stuff, they should be able to censor other stuff too. Failure to do so under our legal system could be actionable.

    So long, Twitter. We hardly knew ye.

    • Now that they are saying they are willing and able to police every message that goes through their system

      They never said that. They said that if they are asked to take material down, they can now do so on a country-by-country basis rather than globally. Does removing content due to a DMCA request cause you to loose "common carrier status"? No, it is necessary to preserve it! Does removing neo-Nazi material in Germany when it is pointed out cause you to loose "common carrier status". No! All this talk about Twitter opening itself up to liability simply by complying with the law is completely unfounded and ignor

  • Nobody worthwhile listening to is using that atrocity anyways.

  • Another reason for me to continue my boycott. To be honest, the only way Twitter makes sense for me is sort of real time support to questions I ask to a company. Apart from that I simply cannot see real benefit for my life.
  • Orgy of stupidity (Score:5, Insightful)

    by vandoravp ( 709954 ) on Sunday January 29, 2012 @11:56AM (#38857977) Homepage
    It seems as though nobody who is reacting to what Twitter has stated actually read or thought about the new policy, instead parading headlines like “Social Suicide”. It's easily the most subversive and transparent approach to censorship to date. They are already obliged by law to remove content in various countries, and have done so. The alternative is complete blocking of the service by the country. Until now, complying required removing content globally. What Twitter has done is made it possible to only remove content in the country that requested the block (reactively, like DMCA takedowns), while still leaving it visible to the rest of the world.

    Now countries with screwball notions of free speech cannot affect beyond their borders. Also, those *inside* the country will be notified that they are seeing blocked content, instead of just an absence, and the censoring will be documented on Chilling Effects. Before, if content were censored, it would be impossible to see it no matter where you are, or where you pretended to be. Now, people's voices can still get out, the oppression of their voices will be more apparent, and it's still possible to get around the censorship if necessary.
    • Why is Twitter operating in those countries? How did they wind up in those countries' jurisdiction? Is not the point of the Internet to enable global communication between computers? Should not Twitter's servers be in a country that does not require censorship (that we do not like)?

      Twitter is not obligated to follow Chinese or Saudi Arabian laws unless they are operating in China or Saudi Arabia. We criticize the US for trying to apply their laws everywhere, so why not hold other countries to the sam
      • Correct. The EFF article points out that Twitter's locations are “United Kingdom, Ireland, Japan, and soon Germany”, in addition to the United States (the “various countries” I was referring to). They are only obligated to act on legal requests inside those countries. This policy allows Twitter to expand its physical presence, without having to then deal with a convoluted mess of free speech laws that are different in each of those countries. And it's not limited to government reques
        • This policy allows Twitter to expand its physical presence

          ...which is necessary because...? Again, the Internet should obviate any need for Twitter to have servers or operations in countries whose laws would require them to censor their users.

          • To meet that requirement, Twitter would have to host their servers on a barge in the middle of the ocean.
    • Now countries with screwball notions of free speech cannot affect beyond their borders.

      you must be mistaken. america is already doing that.

  • by drolli ( 522659 )

    i will continue not to use twitter.

    honestly: the internet was not meant to be dominated by a few servers. If you now have this situation because you are lazy, then i cant help.

  • ...so don't worry. Unless they determine that "I'm eating pie" and "gotta go take a shit" are deemed anti-Government, the other 99% of tweets will remain woefully intact.

    • We can expect the tweets like,"Just got harassed by random homeland security checkpoint" or " Police brutality" to be promptly disappeared.
      • We can expect the tweets like,"Just got harassed by random homeland security checkpoint" or " Police brutality" to be promptly disappeared.

        And much like humans have been doing for thousands of years, we can expect users to adjust to such activity and obfuscate their topics through various methods.

        Siri might be good, but no way in hell is she a match for the human mind. It is still the most powerful computer.

  • "Twitter could have taken a stand and refused to enter any countries with the most restrictive laws against free speech."

    here we see a money-grubbing corp sucking cocks of governments, everywhere.

    if that does not sway you away from using these 'services', I'm not sure what will. do you have a concience? then stop using these things and stop patronizing these evil companies.

    yes, evil. they had something really special and sold out FOR MONEY.

    pathetic.

    • by Sabriel ( 134364 )

      Twitter's approach could make it *easier* to see what your government is censoring.

      I can imagine a browser extension that shows you the "censored" tweets simply by clicking the "This tweet has been removed" text: the extension proxies through another country's service, and you see what your government didn't want you to see. You could even make it automatic.

  • Luckily Twitter has a private option that allows me to whitelist the people who can see my messages.

  • What's Twitter supposed to do? They have two options:

    (a) Agree to censor by regions on the request of governments.

    (b) Have those governments block Twitter so it cannot become a normal part of life in those countries.

    We can't blame Twitter for this, much as I detest it and those Idiocracy-style 140 character updates.

    • by tbird81 ( 946205 )

      We can't blame Twitter for this, much as I detest it and those Idiocracy-style 140 character updates.

      Yes we can. Twitter shouldn't bow to these governments - if the government blocks them, then so be it.

  • by mounthood ( 993037 ) on Sunday January 29, 2012 @12:46PM (#38858367)

    Twitter will be replaced with something that has security built-in and fundamental to its nature. Message signing, sequence integrity, and a distributed hosting system are the obvious next steps.

    Security needs to be designed in at the start. Changing any type of communication after its widespread adoption to be more secure against censorship and offer (more of) the protections of anonymity has proved difficult. Securing email hasn't worked. HTTP was supplemented with a separate protocol rather then having security added. Phones moved from analog to digital but didn't adopt encryption. DNSSEC is an exception that proves the rule.

    Change from Twitter to a new system might take a long time due to the network effect, but people want free speech and the option of anonymity, so it's inevitable.

    • Friendica, Diaspora and others are already up and running and growing exponentially as we speak, which means that technology-wise we're already on the verge of having a federated social web.

      The next problem will be to have a federated social web that is profitable for the people who work to create and maintain it. That's a very, very serious problem by the way. Your federated social web is not really resistant if it depends on Google ads, because that would mean that the whole system would have a single poi

  • The only thing I use my account for is when sites like Macheist or whatever offer something cool for free when you tweet about their event.
  • Diapora is supposed to be out of alpha and into beta within a couple of months. I'll start moving off of Facebook when it does.

    There's a few open microblogging options like Identi.ca.

  • Creating a service that consumes Twitter posts from a variety of a different countries/regions and notes when there is a discrepancy seems like a great way to automatically Streisand Effect the posts that are, for whatever reason, being censored.

    Someone please build that!

  • I and a large group of other people were stalked and harassed on Twitter by a user. This woman was clearly not all there mentally (claimed to be a prophet of God among other things). We complained to Twitter but were told there was nothing they could do. Her harassment, apparently, wasn't a TOS violation. So harass normal users: Fine. Use Twitter to complain about something the local government doesn't want you complaining about? Blocked! Twitter sure has their priorities in order. *rolling eyes*

    (Th

Avoid strange women and temporary variables.

Working...